"You'll be lucky if you get it," she returned. "Come now!" he urged. "Let us take a charitable view, and decide that they will dispense generous hospitality. Upon my soul, I don't see why they shouldn't be charmed to receive us. The Prodigal, you know, got an amazing reception." "Yes," she laughed. "I think possibly we'll get an amazing reception too. Please, if you don't mind, I would rather you took that dead flower out of your coat." "They would never suspect you of putting it there," he protested, with a feeling of strong reluctance to do what she proposed. But Prudence insisted. She knew that when William's eye fell on that withered memento her guilty conscience would give him the clue to its history. "In any case," she added diplomatically, "it adds a look of untidiness." And so the primrose never had the opportunity of lifting its head in water. Before discarding it, Steele was seized with the idea of placing it between the leaves in his pocket-book; but after a glance at the pretty, serious face of his companion he decided against this and left the dead flower lying in the bracken at their feet. "The first brush against the nettles," he remarked, and smiled at her regretfully. "I'm braced now. That first sting hurt more than any other can." The further stings proved embarrassing rather than hurtful. When Steele entered the drawing-room at Court Heatherleigh with Prudence he was made uncomfortably aware of the surprised gaze of five pairs of curious feminine eyes all focussed upon himself, and, advancing under this raking fire, felt his amiable smile of greeting fade before Miss Agatha's blank stare of cold inquiry; her reluctantly extended hand, its chill response to his clasp, reduced him to a state of abject humility. He found himself stammering an apologetic explanation of his presence. "I just looked in to say good-bye," he began awkwardly. "I had the good luck to meet Miss Graynor this morning--" "I presume you mean that you encountered my sister, Prudence?" Miss Graynor interrupted him frigidly. He flushed, and felt savage with himself for being betrayed into the weakness. "I met Miss Prudence--yes, and persuaded her to show me the woods. You have some very beautiful scenery about here; it seemed a pity to miss the best of it, and this was my last opportunity. I made the most of it," he added with a touch of audacity which Miss Agatha inwardly resented. "We've had a delightful time," Prudence interposed defiantly, and turned as her father entered the room and forestalled his reproaches with a light kiss on his unresponsive lips. "I've been picnicking in the woods, daddy," she said brightly. "And now we've come back--for tea." She made this announcement in the tone of a person who does not intend to be denied. Miss Agatha remarked tartly that it was not the hour for tea, and Mr Graynor, ignoring the hospitable suggestion, reproved her for her long absence.