"My dear, and who am I to stand aside like a coward and see you make a mountain of this boy-and-girl affair--an affair which Rudolph and I had practically forgotten--oh, years ago!--until to-day? Why--why, you _can't_ be jealous of me!" Mrs. Pendomer concluded, half-mockingly. Patricia regarded her with deliberation. In the windy sunlight, Mrs. Pendomer was a well-preserved woman, but, unmistakably, preserved; moreover, there was a great deal of her, and her nose was in need of a judicious application of powder, of which there was a superfluity behind her ears. Was this the siren Patricia had dreaded? Patricia clearly perceived that, whatever had been her husband's relations with this woman, he had been manifestly entrapped into the imbroglio--a victim to Mrs. Pendomer's inordinate love of attention, which was, indeed, tolerably notorious; and Patricia's anger against Rudolph Musgrave gave way to a rather contemptuous pity and a half-maternal remorse for not having taken better care of him. "No," answered Mrs. Pendomer, to her unspoken thought; "no woman could be seriously jealous of me. Yes, I dare say, I am _passée_ and vain and frivolous and--harmless. But," she added, meditatively, "you hate me, just the same." "My dear Mrs. Pendomer----" Patricia began, with cool courtesy; then hesitated. "Yes," she conceded; "I dare say, it is unreasonable--but I do hate you like the very old Nick." "Why, then," spoke Mrs. Pendomer, with cheerfulness, "everything is as it should be." She rose and smiled. "I am sorry to say I must be leaving Matocton to-day; the Ullwethers are very pressing, and I really don't know how to get out of paying them a visit----" "So sorry to lose you," cooed Patricia; "but, of course, you know best. I believe some very good people are visiting the Ullwethers nowadays?" She extended the letters, blandly. "May I restore your property?" she queried, with utmost gentleness. "Thanks!" Clarice Pendomer took them, and kissed her hostess, not without tenderness, on the brow. "My dear, be kind to Rudolph. He--he is rather an attractive man, you know,--and other women are kind to him. We of Lichfield have always said that he and Jack Charteris were the most dangerous men that even Lichfield has ever produced----" "Why, do people really find Mr. Charteris particularly attractive?" Patricia demanded, so quickly and so innocently that Mrs. Pendomer could not deny herself the glance of a charlatan who applauds his fellow's legerdemain. And Patricia colored. "Oh, well--! You know how Lichfield gossips," said Mrs. Pendomer. III Colonel Musgrave had smoked a preposterous number of unsatisfying cigarettes on the big front porch of Matocton whilst Mrs. Pendomer was absent on her mission; and on her return, flushed and triumphant, he rose in eloquent silence. "I've done it, Rudolph," said Mrs. Pendomer. "Done what?" he queried, blankly.