“I’ll nurse it going home,” she said.

“You will?  That’s very good of you!” he said, quite gratefully.

“He’s a lucky little beggar!” he remarked, after awhile, as he looked at the black little morsel curled up on the pretty dress.  “Supposing he isn’t claimed, would you care to have him, Miss Falconer?”

She looked down at the dog.

“Thank you,” she said.  “But what shall I give you in return.  It’s unlucky to give an animal without some consideration.”

“Oh, give me another song,” he replied.  “There is nobody about.”

She opened her lips, then checked herself.

“No, I can’t sing again,” she said, in a low voice.

“Oh, all right.  It isn’t good for you to sing too much in the open air.  I’ll wait till this evening, if you’ll be good enough to sing for us then.”

They landed and walked up to the house.  As they reached the bend leading to the entrance path, she stopped and held out the dog, which had been staring at Stafford and whining at intervals.

“Take it, please.  It is fretting for you, and I’d rather not keep it.”

“Really?” he said, and she saw his face brighten suddenly.  “All right, if you’d rather.  Come here, little man!  What’s your name, I wonder?  What shall we call him while we’ve got him?”

“Call him ‘Tiny;’ he’s small enough,” she said, with a shrug of her shoulders.

“Tiny it is!” he assented, brightly.  “He’ll answer to it in a day or two, you’ll see.  I hope you haven’t quite spoilt your dress, Miss Falconer, and won’t regret your row!”

She looked at her dress, but there was a sudden significance in her slow, lingering response.

“I—­don’t—­know!”

As she went up the stairs she looked over the rail and saw Stafford’s tall figure striding down the hall.  He was softly pulling the terrier’s ears and talking to it in the language dogs understand and love; and when she sank into a chair in her room, his face with its manly tenderness was still before her, his deep musical voice, with its note of protection and succour, still rang in her ears.

She sat quite motionless for a minute or two, then she rose and went to the glass and looked at herself; a long, intent look.

“Yes, I am beautiful,” she murmured, not with the self-satisfaction of vanity, but with a calculating note in her voice.  “Am I—­am I beautiful enough?”

Then she swung away from the glass with the motion which reminded Howard of a tigress, and, setting her teeth hard, laughed with self-scorn; but with something, also, of fear in the laugh.

“I am a fool!” she muttered.  “It can’t be true.  So soon!  So suddenly!  Oh, I can’t be such a fool!”

CHAPTER XVII.

If everybody was not enjoying himself at the Villa it certainly was not the fault of the host, Sir Stephen Orme.  Howard, as he drew his chair up beside Stafford, when the ladies had left the room after dinner, and the gentlemen had begun to glance longingly at the rare Chateau claret and the Windermere port, made a remark to this effect: