CHAPTER XIV.
THE PURPLE EMPRESS Colonel De Vigne once more wore his most magisterial air when after breakfast on the following morning he drew Dinah aside.
She looked at him with swift apprehension, even with a tinge of guilt.
His lecture of the previous morning was still fresh in her mind.

Could he have seen her on the ice with Sir Eustace on the previous night, she asked herself?
Surely, surely not! Apparently he had, however; for his first words were admonitory.
"Look here, young lady, you're making yourself conspicuous with that three-volume-novel baronet: You don't want to be conspicuous, I suppose ?" Her face burned crimson at the question.

Then he had seen, or at least he must know, something! She stood before him, too overwhelmed for speech.
"You don't, eh ?" he insisted, surveying her confusion with grim relentlessness.
"Of course not!" she whispered at last.
He put a hand on her shoulder.

"Very well then! Don't let there be any more of it! You've been a good girl up till now but the last two days seem to have turned your head.

I shan't be able to give a good report to your mother when we get home if this sort of thing goes on." Dinah's heart sank still lower.