“Yes, I suppose he has.  Now I shall understand him better.  I’m glad he’s going to be at Rivenoak.  You know that he asked me to advise him about what he should do.  It’ll be rather awkward, though.  I must get him to tell me the truth.”

“You’ll probably have no difficulty in that.  It’s pretty certain that he thinks you know all about him already.  If he hadn’t, I feel sure he wouldn’t go to Rivenoak.”

The girl mused, smiling self-consciously.

“I had better tell you the truth, Mrs. Toplady,” were her next words, in a burst of confidence.  “I think Lord Dymchurch is very nice—­as a friend.  But only as a friend.”

“Thank you for your confidence, May.  Do you know that I suspected something of the kind.”

“I want to be friends with him,” pursued May, impulsively.  “I shall get him to tell me all about himself, and we shall see what he can do.  Of course there mustn’t be any misunderstanding.”

Mrs. Toplady had not been prepared for this tranquil reasonableness.  May was either more primitive, or much more sophisticated, than she had supposed.  Her interest waxed keener.

“Between ourselves, my dear,” she remarked, “that is exactly what I should have anticipated.  You are very young, and the world is at your feet.  Of money you have no need, and, if Lord Dymchurch had had the good fortune to please you—.  But you are ambitious.  I quite understand; trust me.  Poor Dymchurch will never do anything.  He is merely a bookish man.  But, whilst we are talking of it, there’s no harm in telling you that your aunt doesn’t quite see the matter with our eyes.  For some reason—­I don’t know exactly what it is—­Lady Ogram is very favourable to poor Lord Dymchurch.”

“I have noticed that,” said May, quietly.  “Of course it makes no difference.”

“You think not?” asked Mrs. Toplady, beginning to be genuinely impressed by this young woman’s self-confidence.

“I mean that my aunt couldn’t do more than suggest,” May answered, slightly throwing back her head.  “I have only to let her know how I think about anything.”

“You are sure of that?” asked the other, sweetly.

“Oh, quite!”

May’s smile was ineffable.  The woman of the world, the humourist and cynic, saw it with admiration.

“Ah, that puts my mind at ease!” murmured Mrs. Toplady.  “To tell the truth, I have been worrying a little.  Sometimes elderly people are so very tenacious of their ideas.  Of course Lady Ogram has nothing but your good at heart.”

“Of course!” exclaimed the girl.

“Shall I confess to you that I almost fancied this might be the explanation of Miss Bride’s engagement?”

“Miss Bride—?  How?”

“I only tell you for your amusement.  It occurred to me that, having set her heart on a scheme which had reference to Lord Dymchurch, your aunt was perhaps a little uneasy with respect to a much more brilliant and conspicuous man.  Had that been so—­it’s all the merest supposition—­she might have desired to see the brilliant and dangerous man made harmless—­put out of the way.”