"One thing that makes us both care so much," he said diffidently, "is that we both care so much for you." She gave him both hands, regally, and he stooped and kissed them as he might have a queen's. Presently she said: "I'm so glad, dear Johnnie. Nothing in the world could make me happier." It was past eleven o'clock before John left her, and his final inquiry, standing at the hall door, made her laugh outright. "You don't think any one will guess, do you? She doesn't want anything said till her father knows, and unluckily I can't get down to Wales and see him now. There won't be time. But you didn't guess till I told you, did you?" "My dear Johnnie," said Joanna, with a singular absence of any emotion but her habitual kindly satire in her voice, "you really remind me very much sometimes of an ostrich!" XIX Grace Jones went back to the Hostel soon after the New Year in order to pack up and to make her farewells before going for a month's holiday to her home in Wales. "And then Plessing!" said Miss Marsh in an awed voice. "And then Plessing," Grace assented. "Lady Vivian hopes that it will be properly started by that time as a convalescent home." She looked across the sitting-room to where Mrs. Bullivant was sitting, with a smile that held inquiry and congratulation. "Fancy!" ejaculated Mrs. Bullivant, with a sort of timorous pleasure, "Lady Vivian actually thought of me, and suggested my taking over the work of quarter-mistress there. You know, looking after the stores and all that sort of thing. I must say, it's very good of her, and I shall like working there--and Gracie as secretary and all, too. It'll be quite like old times." "I hate changes," observed Miss Henderson gloomily. "This place will be extraordinary, with you gone, Mrs. Bullivant, and Gracie, and probably Tony and Plumtree as well." "Tony isn't leaving, is she?" cried Grace. "Yes, she is. Sent in her resignation two days ago. The fact is, she was altogether upset by that fuss we had about Miss Vivian the other day, and so she's decided that she wants a change. And Greengage says she won't stay without her. They always did hang together, you know." "I don't altogether wonder at poor old Plumtree," Mrs. Potter observed thoughtfully. "Miss Vivian has always had a down on her, hasn't she? But she and Tony will be a loss to the Hostel, and so will you, dear." "I don't like leaving a _bit_," Grace declared; "you've all been so nice to me, and I've been very happy here." It was undeniable, however, that happiness was not destined to be the prevailing characteristic of Miss Jones's last day in the office. Miss Vivian, seated at her paper-strewn table with all the old arrogance, if not actually with an additional touch of it to counteract the humanizing effect of the crêpe mourning band on her left arm, ignored her junior secretary as far as possible, but inspected her work with a closeness of attention that almost argued a desire to find it defective.