closes a subject of conversation.  “Shall I give you some more tea?  No?  Would you like to see how the workmen are getting on?  I think they are working very quickly.  They will want this part of the house presently, and I have an idea of going away for a time; perhaps abroad,” she added, though she had put the idea away from her until this moment, and it was only Lady Bannerdale’s talk of Maude Falconer which started it again in her mind.

Lady Bannerdale, looked alarmed.

“Oh, don’t do that, my dear!” she said.  “If you are obliged to turn out of the house, why not come to us?  It would be so kind and sweet of you.”

Ida sighed a little wearily.

“Oh, I don’t suppose they will insist upon ejecting me,” she said.  “I think I can persuade them to leave me two or three rooms.”

Lady Bannerdale went home and dropped her bomb-shell in the presence of Lord Bannerdale and Edwin.

“Ida rather thinks of going abroad,” she said in a casual way at the dinner table.

Lord Edwin was raising his wine glass to his lips, but arrested it half-way and set it down again; and his handsome face grew long and grave.

“Oh!  We shall miss her,” remarked Lord Bannerdale, lamely, and avoiding looking in his son’s direction.

Not another word was said; but the next day Lord Edwin came into Lady Bannerdale’s room with that affectation of ease and indifference which never yet deceived a mother.

“I’m going to call on Miss Heron, mother,” he said.  “Any message?”

Lady Bannerdale looked at him, her brow wrinkled with motherly anxiety.  There was nothing in the world she desired more than his happiness; and she knew that the marriage with Ida would be in every way desirable:  the girl was one in a thousand, the Bannerdale estates almost joined Herondale; both she and her husband were fond of Ida, who, they knew, would prove a worthy successor to the present mistress of the Grange; but just because it seemed so desirable and Lord Edwin’s heart was so passionately set upon it, the mother was anxious.  She saw that he was dressed with extreme care, and that his face was unusually grave.

“You will give Ida my love, Edwin, please, and tell her—­” She turned away that he might not see her anxiety.  “That is all; but it means a great deal, as you know, Edwin.  I—­I wish you every happiness, my dear boy!”

“Thank you, mother,” he said, by no means in an unmanly way.  “My happiness or unhappiness rests with her.”

When he arrived at the Hall, Ida was just going out for a ride.  She turned back with him to the drawing-room, thinking that he had brought a message from his mother, probably a definite invitation to stay at the Grange, and in her mind she had already decided to decline it.  As he happened to stand with his back to the window the gravity of his face did not enlighten her; and with something like a start she received his first words.