“She is his cousin.”

“So are you.”

“My dear, I am not married.”

“More shame on you,” says Tita, with the ghost of a smile.  “Well, there was Miss Gower!”

“She is not married, either.”

“And no shame to anyone.”  Here Tita, in spite of her wrath, cannot help laughing.  “But really, Margaret, the blame should not be entirely on my side.  If I have to accuse Maurice——­”

“Accuse him!  Of what?”

Tita looks full at her.

“You are a good friend,” says she; “but his mother told me.”

CHAPTER III.

HOW MR. GOWER GROWS DARKLY MYSTERIOUS; AND HOW TITA HEARS OF THE
ARRIVAL OF ANOTHER GUEST.

Tita, going down the stairs after her interview with Margaret, meets Randal in the hall below.

“You look rather down on your luck!” says he.

“My looks belie me, then,” says she stoutly.  “But you—­what is the matter with you?”

“Ruin!” says Mr. Gower tragically.  “My looks do not belie me.”

“Good gracious, Randal!”

“Ruin stares me in the face,” says he, “look where I will.”

“Very rude of it,” says Tita, with an irrepressible laugh.  “One should never stare people out of countenance.  You should speak to Ruin.”

“Oh, it’s all very fine making a joke of it!” says Mr. Gower, who is, however, laughing too.

“Where are you going now?” asks Tita, as he moves away from her towards the hall door.

“‘Anywhere—­anywhere out of the world,’” quotes he, with a dismal shake of the head.

“Is it so serious as all that?” cries Tita.  “Look here, Randal, wait a moment, can’t you?  I have a last request to make.  If you are bent on dying, do it; but do it nicely—­be picturesque:  something original, and no blood.  Promise me there will be no blood!”

“‘So young, and so untender!’” says Gower, gazing at her with deep reproach.

He seems full of quotations.

“But where are you going, really?”

“Out.”

He pauses.

“Not out of your mind, I hope?”

“Don’t be too sure.”

“Well, wait, and I’ll go with you,” says she, glancing at the stand in the hall where her garden hat is generally to be found.

“Not to-day,” says Gower; “you mustn’t come with me to-day.  I’m going out on business.”

“Business!”

Mr. Gower and business seem so very far apart.

“Gruesome business,” repeats he, dropping his voice to a whisper.  “I’m going with my aunt—­’my dear, unmarried aunt.’  It’s my last chance.  I shall do or die to-day, or else”—­an afterthought striking him—­"she will.”

“Where are you going with her?”

“I am taking her,” says Mr. Gower, looking darkly round him, “for a row on the lake.  She says she dotes on lakes.  I don’t think she will dote on your lake when she returns, if”—­with a murderous eye—­“she ever does.”