“It is all a horrible lie,” cried Ivy, crimson with anger and distress. “No wonder she hates me if she believes me to be such a hypocrite as that! I was her friend--but I never will be again, no, nor Ralph’s either. Oh! they will discuss it all and talk me over! and I believe it’s your doing. You told her this lie. How I hate you! how I hate you!” Like a little fury she flung into the fire the pattern which Myra had just cut out for her, and was gone before her companion could get in a single word. Down the street she sped, looking prettier than ever because her eyes were still bright with indignation and her cheeks aglow at the recollection of what had passed. As ill luck would have it, just as she reached the quiet road in which she was lodging with Helen Orme, she came suddenly face to face with Mr. Vane-Ffoulkes. “I had been to inquire if you were in, and to try and persuade you to come and skate this afternoon,” he said eagerly. “The ice in the park will bear they say. Do come.” “But I never skated in my life,” said Ivy. “I’ll teach you, I am sure you would learn in a very little while, and it is just the sort of thing you would do to perfection.” As he spoke a sudden thought darted into Ivy’s mind. Here was a man who for some time had seriously annoyed her by persistent attentions which she did not want. She would now change her tactics, would carry on a desperate flirtation with him, and show these detestable gossips that they were quite in the wrong. As for the Denmeads she would avoid them as much as possible, and to Myra she would not vouchsafe a single word, no--not though they shared dressing-rooms! All this passed through her mind while Mr. Vane-Ffoulkes was assuring her that she would skate like one to the manner born. “I don’t think I can go,” she said hesitatingly. “For one thing I have no skates, and then----” “I will manage the skates if only you will just come and try,” he said persuasively, and after a little more discussion Ivy consented, and the Honorable Bertie in the seventh heaven of happiness hurried away into the High Street, there to procure the most dainty little pair of skates that the place could supply, while Ivy, forgetting her anger in the satisfaction of her new scheme, ran in to make a hasty meal, and to put on the prettiest walking-dress and hat she possessed. Late in the afternoon, Ralph and George Mowbray bicycling back from Brookfield Castle dismounted for a few minutes to watch the skaters in the park, and to speculate as to the chances of the ice for the next day. “Hullo!” exclaimed Ralph, suddenly perceiving a graceful little figure skimming past under the guidance of a tall fair-haired man, “Why there’s Ivy Grant pioneered by the Honorable Bertie! Wonders will never cease.” “So she has caved in at last,” said George Mowbray with a laugh, “having snubbed him all these months I thought she would have contrived to send him about his business. How cock-a-hoop he does look!”