ladies, a grievous ambassador. It really had been the most unpleasant
afternoon he remembered to have spent. He began to feel almost in
fault, almost as if he had done--or at the least had contemplated
doing--something outrageous, something for which he deserved the
punishment which was now being meted out to him. As he slowly approached
Miss Cronin he endeavoured resolutely to bear himself like a man who had
not proposed that day for Miss Van Tuyn's hand. But preposterously, Miss
Cronin's absurd misconception seemed to have power over his conscience,
and that again over his appearance and gait. He was fully aware, as he
went forward to convey Miss Van Tuyn's message, that he made a very poor
show of it. In fact, he was just then living up to Dick's description of
him as "the beard with the gentleman."

"Oh, Mr. Braybrooke," said Miss Cronin as he came up, "so you are here
with Beryl!"

"Yes; so I am here with Miss Van Tuyn!"

Miss Cronin exchanged a glance with Mrs. Clem Hodson.

"You didn't tell me when you called that you were taking her out to
tea!"

"No, I didn't!" said Braybrooke.

"This is my old schoolmate, Mrs. Clem Hodson. Suzanne, this is Mr.
Braybrooke, a friend of Beryl's."

Mrs. Clem Hodson bowed from the waist, and looked at Braybrooke with
the expression of one who knew a great deal more about him than his own