“Mother,” Sybil answered, “do you believe that girls often do fall head over ears in love?  If Mr. Brooks and I met continually, and if he and his father were reconciled, well, I think it would be quite easy for me very soon to care for him a great deal.  If even now he had followed me here, was with us often, and showed that he was really very fond of me, I think that I should soon be inclined to return it—­perhaps even—­I don’t know—­to risk marrying him, and giving up our ordinary life.  But as it is I like to think of him, I should like him to be here; but I am not, as you say, head over ears in love with him.”

“And now about Atherstone?” Lady Caroom said.

“Well, Atherstone has improved a great deal,” Sybil answered, thoughtfully.  “There are a great many things about him which I like very much.  He is always well dressed and fresh and nice.  He enjoys himself without being dissipated, and he is perfectly natural.  He is rather boyish perhaps, but then he is young.  He is not afraid to laugh, and I like the way he enters into everything.  And I think I like his persistence.”

“As his wife,” Lady Caroom said, “you would have immense opportunities for doing good.  He has a great deal of property in London, besides three huge estates in Somerset.”

“That is a great consideration,” Sybil said, earnestly.  “I shall always be thankful that I met Mr. Brooks.  He made me think in a practical way about things which have always troubled me a little.  I should hate to seem thoughtless or ungrateful to him.  Will you tell me something, mother?” Of course.”

“Do you think that he cares—­at all?”

I think he does—­a little!

“Enough to be reconciled with his father for my sake?”

“No!  Not enough for that,” Lady Caroom answered.

Sybil drew a little breath.

“I think,” she said, “that that decides me.”

The long ascent was over at last.  They pulled up before the inn, in front of which the proprietor was already executing a series of low bows.  Before they could descend there was a familiar sound from behind, and a young man, in a grey flannel suit and Panama hat, jumped from his motor and came to the carriage door.

“Don’t be awfully cross!” he exclaimed, laughing.  “You know you half promised to come with me this afternoon, so I couldn’t help having a spin out to see whether I could catch you up.  Won’t you allow me, Lady Caroom?  The step is a little high.”

“It isn’t any use being cross with you,” Sybil remarked.  “It never seems to make any impression.”

“I am terribly thick-skimmed,” he answered, “when I don’t want to understand.  Will you ladies have some tea, or come and see how the restoration is getting on?”

“We were proposing to go and see what the German Emperor’s idea of a Roman camp was,” Sybil answered.

“Oh, you can’t shake me off now, can you, Lady Caroom?” he declared, appealing to her.  “We’ll consider it an accident that you found me here, if you like, but it is in reality a great piece of good fortune for you.”