‘Poor fellow!’ thinks she, regarding the cherries with mixed emotions that are not altogether devoid of admiration for her own hitherto unimagined powers of persuasion; ‘he was certainly and sincerely penitent. One could see that.’ She feels quite an uplifting of her soul. Perhaps, who knows? she has been born as a worthy successor to Mrs. Fry, or some of those good people! But then, after all, it is, undoubtedly, to Mr. Crosby he should have made restitution, not to her. It is, however, difficult to restore Irish cherries—a rather perishable commodity—to an owner who happens to be at the moment in the middle of Africa, or America, or China, for all she knows. ‘Not eat them!’ says Betty indignantly. ‘Why, what else are you going to do with them—make them into jam?’ ‘They are not mine—I’m sure they are not mine,’ says Susan. ‘Who, for instance, could have sent them?’ Here Jacky makes a movement. ‘Jacky, you know nothing!’ cries Susan, turning indignant, warning eyes upon him; whereupon Jacky, remembering his promise, subsides once again into dismal silence. ‘Jacky, I smell a conspiracy,’ says Dominick, who has caught the look between them; ‘and you are the head-centre. Speak, boy, whilst yet there is time!’ ‘I’ve nothing to say,’ says Jacky sulkily; he is naturally of a somewhat morose disposition, and now feels positively ill at not being able to divulge the delightful story of which these glowing cherries are the result. ‘Susan, I do believe you have at last got an admirer,’ says Carew, in the complimentary tone of the orthodox brother, who never can understand why on earth any fellow can admire his sister. ‘Come! out with it; he seems a sensible fellow, any way. Flowers are awful rot, but there’s something in cherries.’ ‘Betty, when I fall in love with you I’ll present you with a course of goodies,’ says Dominick, regarding that damsel with an encouraging eye. ‘I have no admirers, as you all know,’ says Susan, her pale and lovely face a little heightened in colour. She is thinking with horror of what would have happened if that poor awful thief had brought them in person. But, of course, he was afraid. ‘Perhaps Lady Millbank sent them,’ suggests Betty, after a violent discussion with Fitzgerald on the head of his last remark. ‘I saw her in town yesterday.’ ‘So did I,’ says Carew. ‘Like a sack—not tied in the middle.’ Susan feels almost inclined in the emergencies of the moment to say ‘Perhaps so,’ and let it stand at that, but conscience forbids her. ‘She would have sent a footman and her card,’ says she dejectedly. ‘No’—decidedly, and preparing to close up the basket—‘they are not meant for me, and even if they were, I could not accept them, unless I knew where they came from.’ ‘Do you mean that you are not going to give us some?’ says Betty, rising, not only figuratively, but actually, to the occasion, and standing over Susan. ‘I never heard anything so mean in all my life.’