Notwithstanding, the little lady never lost sight of propriety—­Garden was always near enough for her to be able to say, “I’ve my maid with me;” and added to this, “Bella Chetwode was in town, very much occupied it’s true, but still that same staunch friend, always good at a pinch, who, if told that you had been met going to see her, invariably answered that she expected you.  Life is full of surprises, and if one is armed at all points matters go on so much more smoothly.”

Now it happened that on the previous evening Teddy had shown visible signs of becoming unruly.  He didn’t see why he should be sent away.  Why could he not stop—­stop and have dinner with her?

“Why?  Because, in the first place, it wouldn’t do; and in the second—­I forgot though,” she said; “being a man, I ought to have reversed the order—­there’s nothing to give you.”

“That don’t matter,” said Teddy heroically—­“I don’t care what I eat.”

“Oh, don’t you; but I do—­you might be wanting to eat me.”

Teddy threw a look intended to convey that he could conceive no more delicious morsel.

“There there, say good-bye and go away, do!” she cried.  “I declare you’re beginning to get cannibalish already.”

And in spite of all further entreaties and a goodly show of ill-humour, which experience had taught him to keep handy for display, Teddy was forced to obey her command that he should take his departure.

“I must take care not to let that boy go too far,” Nina reflected when he had gone.  “He wants his paces pulled up now and then, or else he’ll get trying to kick over.  However, it’s only for a day or two, and then I shall be off; and by next season—­Oh, he’ll have forgotten me, I daresay.”

She did not “daresay” anything of the sort—­there was a deal too much vanity in her composition to willingly give up any homage that had once been offered to her; but the supposition served as a salve for her conscience, which in the matter was not altogether easy, for in her letters to Rowley, and she wrote to him every day, she had never said a single syllable of having seen Teddy.  It was not that she had any wish to be sly with him; but, reasoning in her own way—­what good was there in telling any one things which would make them uneasy, and Rowley was such a good fellow, so wrapt up in and devoted to her,—­he’d be wretched if she told him that Teddy was in town and came to see her every day.  No; where ignorance was bliss it was folly to let it interfere with fishing; much better let Rowley continue in peace and tranquillity; and on Saturday he and she were to join each other at the Twyford Junction, on their way to Scotland to pay a heap of visits together, some new gowns for which had brought her to London; and her face softened with a smile that flitted across it as she assured herself that ten minutes with Rowley would make her forget the existence of Teddy.  Poor infatuated boy!