But it was no wonder that they both looked pale and stern, and quite unbridal.
The sportsmen started immediately after lunch again, and the ladies returned to their delightful work; and, when they all assembled for tea, everything was almost completed.

Zara had been unable to resist the current of light-hearted gayety which was in the air, and now felt considerably better; so she allowed Lord Elterton to sit beside her after tea and pour homage at her feet, with the expression of an empress listening to an address of loyalty from some distant colony; and the Crow leant back in his chair and chuckled to himself, much to Lady Anningford's annoyance.
"What in the world is it, Crow ?" she said.

"When you laugh like that, I always know some diabolically cynical idea is floating in your head, and it is not good for you.

Tell me at once what you mean!" But Colonel Lowerby refused to be drawn, and presently took Tristram off into the billiard-room.
It was arranged that all the men, even the husbands, were to go down into the great white drawing-room first, so that the ladies might have the pleasure of making an entrance _en bande_, to the delight of every one.

And when this group of Englishmen, so smart in their scarlet hunt coats, were assembled at the end, by the fireplace, footmen opened the big double doors, and the groom of the chambers announced, "Her Majesty, _Queen Guinevere_, and the Ladies of her Court." And Ethelrida advanced, her fair hair in two long plaits, with her mother's all-round diamond crown upon her head, and clothed in some white brocade garment, arranged with a blue merino cloak, trimmed with ermine and silver.