"Not it. When I got to the Jupps' I found they were going to have a late dinner-party. They wanted me to stay for it. Fancy! in this dusty guise of a costume. How delicious those fish look!" "Try them," said Mr. Lake, passing some to her. "I have not caught finer trout this season. Clara has some cold fowl in the house, I think, if you have not dined." "I dined before I came over--that is, had a scrambling sort of cold-meat meal, half dinner, half lunch. Robert, I should like you to catch fish for me always." "How are you getting on with the house, Penelope?" he asked. "Are you straight yet?" "Oh, we are getting on. Anna's worth her weight in gold at that sort of thing. She has been used to contrive and work all her life, you know." "She might be used to worse things," said Mr. Lake. "I have got a--visitor coming to stay with me," resumed Mrs. Chester, making a pause before the word visitor, and then going on with a cough, as if a fish-bone had stuck in her throat. "Who is it?" "Lady Ellis." "Lady Ellis!" echoed Mr. Lake, unaware that his sister had any one of the name on her visiting list. "Who on earth is Lady Ellis?" "Well, she is a friend of the Jupps'." "Oh. And why is she going to visit you?" "Because I choose to ask her," returned Mrs. Chester, in a reproving tone meant for the public benefit, while she gave her brother a private kick under the table. "She is a widow lady, just come home from India in the depth of her sorrow; and she wants to find some quiet country seclusion to put her poor bereaved head into." Mr. Lake concluded that the kick was intended as a warning against asking questions. He put a safe one. "Is she staying with the Jupps?" "Oh dear, no. She went to India a mere child, I fancy. She was very pretty, and was snapped up by some colonel, a K.C.B., and dreadfully old." "Ellis by name, I presume?" carelessly remarked Mr. Lake, as he looked for another nice piece of fish for his sister's plate. "Colonel Sir George Ellis," spoke Mrs. Chester, in a grandly reproving tone, as if the title were good for her mouth. "He is dead, and Lady Ellis has come home." "With a lac of rupees?" "With a _lack_ of rupees," retorted Mrs. Chester, rubbing her sharp nose. "Sir George's property, every shilling of it, was settled on his first wife's children. Lady Ellis has money of her own--not very much." "And why is she coming to you?" "I have told you. She wants quiet and country air." "Will she pay you?" "Pay me! Good gracious, Robert, what mercenary ideas you have! Do you hear him, Clara? Oh, thank you; don't heap my plate like that, though I think I never did taste such fish. The Jupps have been praising her to the skies, one trying to out-talk the rest. Never were such talkers as the Jupp girls." "Except yourself," put in Mr. Lake. Mrs. Chester lifted her eyes in surprise. "Myself! Why, I am remarkably silent. Nobody can say I talk."