Annoyed because of that uncalled-for blush, far away from the Little Red Chimney, with fairy-tales forgot, Margaret Elizabeth repeated her aunt’s question.  After all, who was Mr. Reynolds?  That which had so lately seemed an adventure compounded of kindliness and fun, she now beheld only as an awkward situation.  She began to feel that she had overstepped the bounds in asking him to the Christmas tree; and the red stocking!  What nonsense!  Why should she have felt concerned over his loneliness?  Were there not many lonely people in the world?  Might he not infer from it all a rather excessive interest in him and his affairs?  Her interview with Tim at the hospital, for instance, though it had come about by the purest chance, looked on the surface as if she had been bent upon investigating him.

The Candy Man’s offering, which she at first found so happily significant and appropriate, now began to seem almost a piece of presumption.  It lay ignored if not forgotten, till its brown and withered contents were tossed into the fire by one of the maids.  Did Miss Bentley wish her to save the basket?

No, Miss Bentley cared nothing for it.  Or, wait—­she liked sweet grass, and on second thought she would keep it.

Never had the holiday season been so gay.  There was not time for a minute’s connected thought.  Margaret Elizabeth honestly tried to keep her promise to stop and reflect for at least ten minutes a day, but either she went to sleep, or fell into a waking dream that bore small relation to the sober realities upon which she was supposed to dwell.

There were guests at Pennington Park for the holidays—­English friends of her uncle and aunt, persons of a broader culture than Margaret Elizabeth had ever before encountered.  They afforded her an object lesson of the best that accrues from wealth and tradition, and is only to be attained by means of them.  Within herself she was aware of an aptitude of her own for these things.

But half divining her niece’s mood, Mrs. Gerrard Pennington skilfully and subtly fostered it, and Augustus McAllister, with unexpected tact, followed her lead.

Augustus was genuinely in love, and it brought out the best that was in him.  For the first time in his life something resembling humility manifested itself, a humility which sat gracefully upon the possessor of variously estimated millions.  It seemed to say:  “Here is one who, although not brilliant, may be led into any desirable path.”  And with his other substantial attractions he combined his full share of good looks.

To be unresponsive was not in Miss Bentley’s make-up, and the attentions of Augustus assumed in these days a delicate and pleasing character.  What girl could be indifferent to the prestige born of the generally accepted opinion that the position of mistress of the Towers was hers for the word?

In truth, all this homage—­and Augustus was far from being alone in it—­was to Margaret Elizabeth an exciting game, that need not be taken too seriously.  It was only when she thought of the Candy Man that she became serious and annoyed.  How impossible, in the atmosphere of Pennington Park, appeared any explanation or justification of so absurd a position as his!