"Did it really take two marriages?" murmured Paul. His companion smiled at the joke against himself, and they stood for a moment in silence, looking over the lawn that had just acquired its fresh bloom of green. Katharine's voice came out to them again through the open window, this time raised in indignant dispute with her aunt. "She is a curious mixture of hardness and sentiment," said Paul involuntarily, "and her surroundings have made her a prig; but she interests me rather." "Ah," said Heaton, "I quite agree with you. There _is_ a touch of the prig about her. But can you wonder? She is the only bit of life and prettiness about the place, and she never meets her equal. They think a good lot of her, too. And the parson's daughter generally thinks a good lot of herself." "She does it rather charmingly," said Paul, in a dispassionate tone, "and she is fairly well read, and knows how to express herself. For a woman, she has quite a sense of criticism." "That's bad," said Heaton decidedly, "very bad. A woman should have no sense of criticism. That is what makes her a prig. In fact, as I have often said to you before, a prig is made in three ways. First of all, she is made by her own people, if she happens to be clever; and secondly, by the world, if she happens to be successful; and thirdly, by her lover, if she isn't in love with him. But of course if she _is_ in love with him he may be the cause of her unmaking." Some one in a light-coloured print frock jumped out of a side window and disappeared in the direction of the summer-house. The two men stood and looked after her without being noticed. "As you say," remarked Heaton blandly, "she does it rather charmingly." Paul roused himself with an effort. "Half-past three," he said, looking at his watch. "Didn't you promise to go and look at the Rector's coins some time this afternoon?" And in another five minutes he had joined Katharine in the summer-house. CHAPTER V The summer house was set far back in the shrubbery, and although hidden from the house by laurels and box-trees, was open at the front to a stretch of brightly coloured flower beds and trimly cut grass. It was a glorious day in May, and spring in its fulness was come. The white fruit blossoms had given place to crumpled green leaves, and the early summer flowers were in bud. Paul Wilton lay on a low basket chair, where he had flung himself down after making his escape from his garrulous friend; and at his feet, with an open book on her lap, sat Katharine. Obviously, a great many poor women had lost a great many babies, since the day she had sat on the chair at the end of his bed and talked about her favourite poets, for the book on her lap was only a pretence to which neither of them paid the least attention, and their conversation was of a purely personal nature, the kind of conversation that has no subject and no epigrams, and is carried on in half-finished sentences.