You know that way a man has of looking at you—one sees it even in a place like this where there are only curates and things. He has brown eyes—like dark bright water in pools. Oh, Alice, if he should!”

Alice was not perhaps as enthusiastic as her sister. Amabel had seen him first and in the Darrel household there was a sort of unwritten, not always observed code flimsily founded on “First come first served.” Just at the outset of an acquaintance one might say “Hands off” as it were. But not for long.

“It doesn’t matter how pretty one is they seldom do,” Alice grumbled. “And he mayn’t have a farthing.”

“Alice,” whispered Amabel almost agonizingly, “I wouldn’t care a farthing—if only he would! Have I a farthing—have you a farthing—has anyone who ever comes here a farthing? He lives in London. He’d take me away. To live even in a back street in london would be Heaven! And one must—as soon as one possibly can.—One must! And Oh!” with another hug which this time was a shudder, “think of what Doris Harmer had to do! Think of his thick red old neck and his horrid fatness! And the way he breathed through his nose. Doris said that at first it used to make her ill to look at him.”

“She’s got over it,” whispered Alice. “She’s almost as fat as he is now. And she’s loaded with pearls and things.”

“I shouldn’t have to ‘get over’ anything,” said Amabel, “if this one would. I could fall in love with him in a minute.”

“Did you hear what Father said?” Alice brought out the words rather slowly and reluctantly. She was not eager on the whole to yield up a detail which after all added glow to possible prospects which from her point of view were already irritatingly glowing. Yet she could not resist the impulse of excitement. “No, you didn’t hear. You were out of the room.”

“What about? Something about him? I hope it wasn’t horrid. How could it be?”

“He said,” Alice drawled with a touch of girlishly spiteful indifference, “that if he was one of the poor Gareth-Lawlesses he hadn’t much chance of succeeding to the title. His uncle—Lord Lawdor—is only forty-five and he has four splendid healthy boys—perfect little giants.”

“Oh, I didn’t know there was a title. How splendid,” exclaimed Amabel rapturously. Then after a few moments’ innocent maiden reflection she breathed with sweet hopefulness from under the sheet, “Children so often have scarlet fever or diphtheria, and you know they say those very strong ones are more likely to die than the other kind. The Vicar of Sheen lost four all in a week. And the Vicar died too. The doctor said the diphtheria wouldn’t have killed him if the shock hadn’t helped.”

Alice—who had a teaspoonful more brain than her sister—burst into a fit of giggling it was necessary to smother by stuffing the sheet in her mouth.

“Oh! Amabel!” she gurgled. “You are such a donkey! You would have been silly enough to say that even if people could have heard you. Suppose he had!”

“Why should he care,” said Amabel simply. “One can’t help thinking things. If it happened he would be the Earl of Lawdor and—”

She fell again into sweet reflection while Alice giggled a little more. Then she herself stopped and thought also. After all perhaps—! One had to be practical. The tenor of her thoughts was such that she did not giggle again when Amabel broke the silence by whispering with tremulous, soft devoutness.

“Alice—do you think that praying really helps?”

“I’ve prayed for things but I never got them,” answered Alice.