"I want you to get a side-saddle ready for Brunette to-morrow, Hollis," said Arthur. "Mrs. Considine and I are going for a ride over the hill." At the end of the stables they encountered a pair of golden retrievers. For a moment they stared at Arthur, and then, suddenly recognising him, made for him together, jumping up with their paws on his shoulders and licking him with their pale tongues. "What beauties," Gabrielle cried. "Yes, they come from Banbury," he said. "I'll get you a pup next term if you'd like one." Their evening was crowded with such small wonders. "I can't show you half the things I want to," he said. "It's ridiculous that you should only be here for three days." He would have gone on for ever, and she had to warn him when the clock in the stables struck seven that they had only just time to dress for dinner. On the way upstairs he showed her his new study, with the bookshelves that he had bought in the last holidays. "I do all my writing here," he said, and then suddenly but shyly emboldened: "it was here that I wrote to you when I sent you the cowslips." He had never dared to mention the incident before. "You didn't answer me," he went on. "Why didn't you answer me? I wish you'd tell me." "Arthur--I couldn't--you know that I couldn't." A panic seized her and she went blushing to her room. She was still flushed with excitement or pleasure when she came down to dinner. Mrs. Payne, in a matronly dress of black, sat at the head of the table with Arthur and Gabrielle on either side of her facing each other. The arrangement struck her as a triumph of strategy. From this central position she could see them both and intercept any such glances as had passed between them in the church at Lapton. In this she was disappointed, for there was nothing to be seen in the behaviour of either but a transparent happiness. "They only want encouragement," she thought, and settled down deliberately to put them at their ease, a proceeding that was quite unnecessary for the last feeling that could have entered either of their minds was that of guilt. So the evening passed, in the utmost propriety. No look, no sign, no symptom of unusual tenderness appeared. It even seemed that Gabrielle was particularly anxious to make the conversation general. "Oh, you're artful!" thought Mrs. Payne, "but I'll have you yet." They talked of Lapton, of Considine and of the Traceys. Only once did Mrs. Payne surprise a single suspicious circumstance. "I showed Mrs. Considine the dogs, mother," he said. "She's fallen in love with Boris." "Yes, his eyes are like amber," said Gabrielle. "So I thought I'd like to write to Banbury to-morrow and get her a puppy."