she perceived a look pass between the two aunts. She sat swelling
while talk about the chances of rain was passing round her, the
forecasts in the paper, the cats washing their faces, the swallows
flying low, the upshot being that it might be fine, but that
emergencies were to be prepared for. All the time that Lady Merrifield
was giving orders to children and servants for the preparations,
Dolores kept her station, and the instant there was a vacant moment,
she said fiercely--

'Aunt Lilias, I know there is a letter for me. Let me have it.'

'Your father told me you might have letter from Miss Sefton, and there
is none from her,' said Lady Merrifield, with a somewhat perplexed air.

'I may have letters from whom I choose.'

'My dear, that is not the custom in general with girls of your age, and
I know your father would not wish it. Tell me, is there any one you
have reason to expect to hear from?'

Dolores had an instinct that all the Mohuns were set against the person
she was thinking of, but she had an answer ready, true, but which would
serve her purpose.

'There was a person, Herr Muhlwausser, that father ordered some
scientific plates from--of microscopic zoophytes. He said he did not
know whether anything would come of it, but, in case it should, he gave
my address, and left me a cheque to pay him with. I have it in my desk
upstairs.'