A deadly feud, entirely of Miss Beccles' initiating and nourishing, had existed between them for years.

They had been neither on speaking nor on writing terms.

Miss Beccles, ten years Lady Fenimore's senior, was, from all I had heard, a most disagreeable and ill-conditioned person, as different from my charming friend Edith Fenimore as the ugly old sisters were from Cinderella.

Although she belonged to a good old South of England family, she had joined, for reasons known only to herself, the old Free Kirk of Scotland, found a congenial Calvinistic centre in Galloway, and after insulting her English relations and friends in the most unconscionable way, cut herself adrift from them for ever.

"Mad as a hatter," Sir Anthony used to say, and, never having met the lady, I agreed with him.