Agatha flushed oddly this time.  Her delicate skin registered every emotion exquisitely.  “He has seen her, but she was in the school-room, and—­I don’t think—­”

She did not finish, but stopped uneasily, and sat and gazed out of the open window into the park.  She did not look happy.

The episode of Sir Bruce Norman was brief and even vague.  It had begun well.  Sir Bruce had met the beauty at a ball, and they had danced together more than once.  Sir Bruce had attractions other than his old baronetcy and his coal-mines.  He was a good-looking person, with a laughing brown eye and a nice wit.  He had danced charmingly and paid gay compliments.  He would have done immensely well.  Agatha had liked him.  Emily sometimes thought she had liked him very much.  Her mother had liked him and had thought he was attracted.  But after a number of occasions of agreeable meetings, they had encountered each other on the lawn at Goodwood, and he had announced that he was going to India.  Forthwith he had gone, and Emily had gathered that somehow Lady Agatha had been considered somewhat to blame.  Her people were not vulgar enough to express this frankly, but she had felt it.  Her younger sisters had, upon the whole, made her feel it most.  It had been borne in upon her that if Alix, or Millicent with the red-gold cloak, or even Eve, who was a gipsy, had been given such a season and such Doucet frocks, they would have combined them with their wonderful complexions and lovely little chins and noses in such a manner as would at least have prevented desirable acquaintances from feeling free to take P. and O. steamers to Bombay.

In her letter of this morning, Millicent’s temper had indeed got somewhat the better of her taste and breeding, and lovely Agatha had cried large tears.  So it was comforting to be told that Lord Walderhurst had said such an extremely amiable thing.  If he was not young, he was really very nice, and there were exalted persons who absolutely had rather a fad for him.  It would be exceptionally brilliant.

The brisk walk was taken, and Lady Agatha returned from it blooming.  She was adorable at dinner, and in the evening gathered an actual court about her.  She was all in pink, and a wreath of little pink wild roses lay close about her head, making her, with her tall young slimness, look like a Botticelli nymph.  Emily saw that Lord Walderhurst looked at her a great deal.  He sat on an extraordinarily comfortable corner seat, and stared through his monocle.

Lady Maria always gave her Emily plenty to do.  She had a nice taste in floral arrangement, and early in her visit it had fallen into her hands as a duty to “do” the flowers.

The next morning she was in the gardens early, gathering roses with the dew on them, and was in the act of cutting some adorable “Mrs. Sharman Crawfords,” when she found it behoved her to let down her carefully tucked up petticoats, as the Marquis of Walderhurst was walking straight toward her.  An instinct told her that he wanted to talk to her about Lady Agatha Slade.