"I was thinking of other things--I don't know why--horrid things. Are you one of a large family?" "No," he answered, surprised. "I'm an only son--and rather a bad investment. Why?" "There are eight of us," said Prudence--"counting Bobby." "Who is Bobby?" "He's a dear," she answered, as though that explained Bobby. "He's at college: when he leaves he will have to go into the factory; and he hates it so. But there isn't any help for it. He is the only Graynor to carry on." "I don't think his case calls for sympathy exactly," he remarked dryly, with a contemplative eye on the tall red chimneys, an eye that travelled slowly over the wide spring-clad countryside and came back to her face and rested there in quiet enjoyment. "You don't know," she returned seriously, "how the kind of life we lead here stifles an imaginative person." "You find it dull?" he said. "I suppose it may be. Most country towns are dull." "The country isn't to blame," she explained; "it's the routine of dull business, dull duties, dull pleasures, and duller people. You've no idea... How should you know? Virtue, as practised in Wortheton, is a quality without smiles, and enjoyment is sinful. Instead of idling happily here I ought to be at home sewing garments for the poor, like the others are doing. I shall be reproved for flaying truant... and I don't care." She laughed joyously. Steele, ignoring the larger part of her communications, leaned towards her, intent on bringing her back to a particular phrase that stuck in his memory. "Are you happy sitting here--with me?" he asked. "I'm always happy," Prudence replied calmly, "when I've some one to talk to who isn't Wortheton." "Oh!" he said, a little damped. "So that's it? Well, I'm happy sitting here talking with some one who is Wortheton." "I'm not up to sample," she said, amused. "If you want local colour, call at the Vicarage--or take William as a specimen. Wortheton is earnest in woof." She looked so pretty and so impish as she drew her invidious comparisons that Steele was unable to suppress a smile of sympathy. Her criticism of her brother was wanting in loyalty; but he could find in his heart no blame for her: he did not like William, possibly because William had so pointedly refrained from extending further hospitality to him. The young man had counted on an extension, and was disappointed. "You'll shake the dust off your feet some day," he hazarded, and thought how agreeable it would be to assist in the escape. Visions of scorching across country in a motor with her beside him floated pleasantly through his brain. "Some day," she returned a little vaguely, and looked pensively into the distance. "Yes, I'll do that... But it's so difficult to find a way." "Time will solve that difficulty, I expect," he said.