Anne Trevelyan did not answer for a moment, and there was a little more colour in her handsome face. “Yes,” she said, after a few seconds. “That’s it. Rather humiliating, isn’t it? All the same, I would rather that you should know.” “Thank you. But you don’t give him much encouragement to be nice to you, do you?” “Well, hardly!” answered Anne, holding up her head. “I don’t think it would be very nice if I did, considering that he evidently dislikes me.” “You’re quite mistaken,” said Lionel in a tone of certainty. “If you did not pretend to ignore him half the time, as you do, you would soon find it out.” “Nonsense! You might as well say that he likes that dreadful governess!” “I don’t think Miss Scott at all dreadful,” answered Lionel, in a tone that made his companion look at him quickly. “Her looks are against her, I admit, but I assure you she is a very nice girl.” “I was only thinking of her looks, of course. And I forgot that you knew her father. What did you say he was?” She asked the question in a tone of real interest, which was intended as a sort of [Illustration: “‘I don’t think Miss Scott at all dreadful,’ answered Lionel.” ] apology for having said anything against the governess. “He’s in the British Museum; but he is not really her father. He adopted her and brought her up, that’s all. She was left on his doorstep, I believe.” “Really! How interesting! Do tell me all about it.” “There’s not very much to tell,” said Lionel. “Herbert Scott has been in the Museum five-and-twenty years, I believe, and has always lived in the same little house in Kensington. He began life in India, and I fancy he must be almost sixty. One morning, about twenty-two years ago, he was lying awake at dawn, when he heard a child crying just under his window. At first he paid no attention to the sound, but as it went on persistently, he went down and opened the door. He found a little girl baby, nicely dressed and quite clean, lying on the doorstep, kicking and screaming. He thought the baby might be about a year old. That’s the story.” “Except the rest of it,” observed Miss Trevelyan. “The interesting thing would be to know what he did with it--a man living alone, and who had probably never touched a baby in his life!” “He went to the police and made inquiries, and advertised, but as he could not get any information, and the woman servant he had was a respectable middle-aged widow who was fond of children, they kept it and brought it up. That’s all I know.” “I have heard of such things before,” said Anne Trevelyan thoughtfully. “The child must have been kidnapped by thieves who tried to get a ransom and failed.” “Or gipsies,” suggested Lionel.