than that of the master thereof, Member of Parliament though he was, and Justice of the Peace and Lord of the Manor?  And Paul, fresh from his retrospect, looked at the girl’s thin shoulders and sharp, intent profile, and wondered a little, somewhat ironically.  He knew that she regarded him as a kind of god, for reasons of caste.  Yet she was the daughter of a Morebury piano tuner, of unblemished parentage for generations.  She had never known hunger and cold and the real sting of poverty.  Miss Winwood herself knew more of drunken squalor.  He saw himself a ragged and unwashed urchin, his appalling breeches supported by one brace, addressing her in familiar terms; and he saw her transfigured air of lofty disgust; whereupon he laughed aloud in the middle of a most unhumorous sentence, much to Miss Smithers’ astonishment.

When he had finished his dictation he dismissed her and sat down to his writing.  After a while Miss Winwood came in.  The five years had treated her lightly.  A whitening of the hair about her brows, which really enhanced the comeliness of her florid complexion, a few more lines at corners of eyes and lips, were the only evidences of the touch of Time’s fingers.  As she entered Paul swung round from his writing chair and started to his feet.  I “Oh, Paul, I said the 20th for the Disabled Soldiers and Sailors, didn’t I?  I made a mistake.  I’m engaged that afternoon.”

“I don’t think so, dearest lady,” said Paul.

“I am.”

“Then you’ve told me nothing about it,” said Paul the infallible.

“I know,” she said meekly.  “It’s all my fault.  I never told you.  I’ve asked the Bishop of Frome to lunch, and I can’t turn him out at a quarter-past two, can I?  What date is there free?”

Together they bent over the engagement book, and after a little discussion the new date was fixed.

“I’m rather keen on dates to-day,” said Paul, pointing to the brass calendar.

“Why?”

“It’s exactly five years since I entered your dear service,” said Paul.

“We’ve worked you like a galley slave, and so I love your saying ‘dear service,’” she replied gently.

Paul, half sitting on the edge of the Cromwellian table in the bay of the window, laughed.  “I could say infinitely more, dearest lady, if I were to let myself go.”

She sat on the arm of a great leathern chair.  Their respective attitudes signified a happy intimacy.  “So long as you’re contented, my dear boy—–­” she said.

“Contented?  Good heavens!” He waved a protesting hand.

“You’re ambitious.”

“Of course,” said he.  “What Would be the good of me if I wasn’t?”

“One of these days you’ll be wanting to leave the nest and—­what shall we say?—­soar upwards.”

Paul, too acute to deny the truth of this prophecy said:  “I probably shall.  But I’ll be the rarissima avis, to whom the abandoned nest will always be the prime object of his life’s consideration.”