silver arrow, seemingly moved by interior clockwork, just now pointed to “Tea, five o’clock,” and while she was yet looking at it, a musical little bell rang very persistently behind the dial for about a minute, and then ceased. “Tea-time, of course!” she said, and glancing at her watch she saw it was just five o’clock. “What a capital invention! One of these in each room saves all the ugly gong-beating and bell-ringing which is common in most houses; I had better go.” She went at once, running down the broad staircase with light feet as buoyantly as a girl, and remembering her way easily to the room where she had breakfasted in the morning. Madame Dimitrius was there alone, knitting placidly, and looking the very picture of contentment. She smiled a welcome as Diana entered. “So you have come back to us!” she said. “I am very glad! One lady who answered my son’s advertisement, went to see after her luggage in the same manner as you were told to do--and--ran away!” “Ran away!” echoed Diana. “What for?” The old lady laughed. “Oh, I think she got afraid at the last moment! Something my son said, or _looked_, scared her! But he was not surprised,--he has always given every applicant a chance to run away!” “Not me!” said Diana, merrily. “For he made me sign an agreement, and gave me some of my salary in advance--he would hardly expect me to run away with his money?” “Why not?” and Dimitrius himself entered the room. “Why not, Miss May? Many a woman and many a man has been known to make short work with an agreement,--what is it but ‘a scrap of paper’? And there are any number of Humans who would judge it ‘clever’ to run off with money confidingly entrusted to them!” “You are cynical,” said Diana. “And I don’t think you mean what you say. You know very well that honour stands first with every right-thinking man or woman.” “Right-thinking! Oh, yes!--I grant you that,”--and he drew a chair up to the tea-table where his mother had just seated herself. “But ‘right-thinking’ is a compound word big enough to cover a whole world of ethics and morals. If ‘right-thinking’ were the rule instead of the exception, we should have a real Civilisation instead of a Sham!” Diana looked at him more critically and attentively than she had yet done. His personality was undeniably attractive,--some people would have considered him handsome. He had wonderful eyes,--they were his most striking feature--dark, deep, and sparkling with a curiously brilliant intensity. He had spoken of his Russian nationality, but there was nothing of the Kalmuck about him,--much more of the picturesque Jew or Arab. An indefinable grace distinguished his movements, unlike the ordinary type of lumbersome man, who, without military or other training, never seems to know what to do with his hands or his feet. He noticed Diana’s intent study of him, and smiled--a charming smile, indulgent and kindly.