"I am sorry," she whispered; "it all began beautifully, and--Joan isn't like me," she hurried out again, "she is proud and--well, you would understand"--she appealed to Mabel--"for you are proud, too--if you had to earn your money as she has to." Then she turned and hurried after her retreating companion. Something that she had said stayed, however, like a little pin-prick, in Mabel's thoughts. It brought her to a sudden realization of Joan's feelings and regret that she had not succeeded in being nicer to the girl. "If Dick is married to either of those two young ladies," said Mrs. Grant heavily, "he is ruined already." She rose majestically and gathered up her work. "I have been thoroughly upset," she announced, "and must go and lie down. Perhaps when Dick comes back you will point out to him that some explanation is necessary to me for the extraordinary scene I have just been through. I shall be ready to see him in an hour." Fanny wept a few tears on the drive home. It had all been her fault, she explained between sniffs to Joan. "And I promised not to talk too much," she gulped. "Oh, honey, don't let it stand between him and you"--she nodded at Dick's back, for he was occupying the front seat alone--"I shall never forgive myself if you do." "Don't fuss, Fanny," Joan answered; she was beginning to feel thoroughly ashamed of her ill-mannered outburst. "And for goodness' sake don't cry. You have not brought anything more between us than has always been there." "Oh, I wish we hadn't gone," wailed Fanny. "He wants to marry you, Joan; they always do if they introduce their mothers to you." For no reason whatsoever, for she had not thought of him for months, a memory of Gilbert flashed into Joan's mind. Her eyes were fixed on the back of Dick's head, and it was strange--the feeling that surged over her as she brought these, the two men in her life, before her mind's eye. Perhaps it was only at that very moment that she realized her love for Dick; realized it and fought against it in the same breath. She had known him so short a time; he had been kind to her; but what, after all, did that amount to? When the company left Sevenoaks he would probably never see her or think of her again. Does one build love from so fleeting a fancy? None the less the thought brought her to a mood of gentleness and she could not bear to let him go away thinking her still hurt and angry. As he helped her out of the car she smiled at him. "I am sorry that I lost my temper and was rude," she said. Fanny had fled indoors and left them tactfully alone. "I don't know what you must think of me." Her eyes fell away from his, he saw the slow red creeping into her cheeks. "Don't," he spoke quickly, he was for the moment feeling very vindictive against Mabel. "When you apologize you make it ten times worse. It was not your fault the least little bit in the world."