“I remember,” her husband assented.  “Very well, then, at dinner-time to-night you can tell me your decision, or rather we will discuss it together.  James,” he added, turning to the footman, “tell Robert I want my sixteen-bore guns put in the car, and tell him to be very careful about the cartridges.”

He disappeared through the French windows.  Lady Ashleigh was studying the letter stretched out before her, her brows a little knitted, her expression distressed.  Ella had turned and was looking out westwards across the park, towards the sea.  For a moment she dreamed of all the wonderful things that lay on the other side of that silver streak.  She saw inside the crowded Opera House.  She felt the tense hush, the thrill of excitement.  She heard the low sobbing of the violins, she saw the stage-setting, she heard the low notes of music creeping and growing till every pulse in her body thrilled with her one great enthusiasm.  When she turned back to the table, her eyes were bright and there was a little flush upon her cheeks.

“You’re not sorry, mother?” she exclaimed.

“Not really, dear,” Lady Ashleigh answered resignedly.

2.

Lord Ashleigh, who in many respects was a typical Englishman of his class, had a constitutional affection for small ceremonies, an affection nurtured by his position as Chairman of the County Magistrates and President of the local Unionist Association.  After dinner that evening, a meal which was served in the smaller library, he cleared his throat and filled his glass with wine.  His manner, as he addressed his wife and daughter, was almost official.

“I am to take it, I believe,” he began, “that you have finally decided, Ella, to embrace our friend Delarey’s suggestion and to leave us on Saturday for New York?”

“If you please,” Ella murmured, with glowing eyes.  “I can’t tell you how grateful I am to you both for letting me go.”

“It is naturally a wrench to us,” Lord Ashleigh confessed, “especially as circumstances which you already know of prevent either your mother or myself from being with you during the first few months of your stay there.  You have very many friends in New York, however, and your mother tells me that there will be no difficulty about your chaperonage at the various social functions to which you will, of course, be bidden.”

“I think that will be all right, dad,” Ella ventured.

“You will take your own maid with you, of course,” Lord Ashleigh continued.  “Lenora is a good girl and I am sure she will look after you quite well, but I have decided, although it is a somewhat unusual step, to supplement Lenora’s surveillance over your comfort by sending with you, also, as a sort of courier and general attendant—­whom do you think?  Well, Macdougal.”

Lady Ashleigh looked across the table with knitted brows.

“Macdougal, George?  Why, however will you spare him?”