Mela said over her shoulder to the student of human nature, "The next time I see you I'll give it to you for what you said about Moffitt." Margaret made some entreating paces after them, but she did not succeed in covering the retreat of the sisters against critical conjecture.

She could only say to Conrad, as if recurring to the subject, "I hope we can get our friends to play for us some night.

I know it isn't any real help, but such things take the poor creatures out of themselves for the time being, don't you think ?" "Oh yes," he answered.

"They're good in that way." He turned back hesitatingly to Mrs.Horn, and said, with a blush, "I thank you for a happy evening." "Oh, I am very glad," she replied, in her murmur.
One of the old friends of the house arched her eyebrows in saying good-night, and offered the two young men remaining seats home in her carriage.

Beaton gloomily refused, and she kept herself from asking the student of human nature, till she had got him into her carriage, "What is Moffitt, and what did you say about it ?" "Now you see, Margaret," said Mrs.Horn, with bated triumph, when the people were all gone.
"Yes, I see," the girl consented.