“So it is really you!” exclaimed Mrs. Lashmar, in a voice of forced welcome.  “I thought you must have altogether forgotten us.”

“It’s the first time I have returned to Alverholme,” replied the other, in a contrasting tone of calmness.

“And what are you doing?  Where are you living?  Tell me all about yourself.  Are you still at the hospital?  You did get a place at a hospital, I think?  We were told so.”

Mrs. Lashmar’s patronage was a little more patronizing than usual, her condescension one or two degrees more condescending.  She had various reasons for regarding Constance Bride with disapproval, the least of them that sense of natural antipathy which was inevitable between two such women.  In briefest sentences Miss Bride made known that she had given up dispensing two years ago, and was now acting as secretary to a baronet’s widow.

“A baronet’s widow?” repeated the hostess, with some emphasis of candid surprise.  “Row did you manage that?  Who is she?”

“An old friend of my family,” was the balanced reply.  “Lady Ogram, of Rivenoak, near Hollingford.”

“Oh!  Indeed!  I wasn’t aware—­”

Mrs. Lashmar thought better of her inclination to be trenchantly rude, and smoothed off into commonplaces.  Presently the vicar entered, and found his wife conversing with the visitor more amiably than he had expected.

“You have seen Miss Bride already,” said Mrs. Lashmar.  “I am trying to persuade her to stay over-night with us.  Is it really impossible?”

Constance civilly but decidedly declined.  Addressing herself to the vicar, she spoke with more ease and friendliness than hitherto; nevertheless, it was obvious that she counted the minutes dictated by decency for the prolongation of her stay.  Once or twice her look wandered to a certain part of the wall where hung a framed photograph—­a portrait of Dyce Lashmar at the age of one and twenty; she regarded it for an instant with cold fixity, as though it interested her not at all.  Just as she was on the point of rising, there came a sound of wheels on the vicarage drive.

“Who’s that, I wonder?” said Mrs. Lashmar.  “Why—­surely it isn’t—?”

A voice from without had reached her ears; surprise and annoyance darkened her countenance.

“It’s certainly Dyce,” said the vicar, who for his part, recognized the voice with pleasure.

“Impossible!  He said he was coming in a week’s time.”

Mr. Lashmar would not have cared to correct this statement, and remark was rendered superfluous by the opening of the door and the appearance of Dyce himself.

“Afraid I’m taking you rather at unawares,” said the young man, in a suave Oxford voice.  “Unexpectedly I found myself free—­”

His eyes fell upon Constance Bride, and for a moment he was mute; then he stepped towards her, and, with an air of peculiar frankness, of comrade-like understanding, extended his hand.