“They say that poor Tom Leffingwell has not yet finished paying his debts,” continued Mrs. Dwyer, “although his uncle, Eleanor Hanbury’s father, cancelled what Randolph had had from him in his will.  It was twenty-five thousand dollars.  James Hanbury, you remember, had him appointed consul at Nice.  Randolph Leffingwell gave the impression of conferring a favour when he borrowed money.  I cannot understand why he married that penniless and empty-headed beauty.”

“Perhaps,” said Mrs. Hayden, “it was because of his ability to borrow money that he felt he could afford to.”

The eyes of the two ladies unconsciously followed Honora about the room.

“I never knew a better or a more honest woman than Mary Leffingwell, but I tremble for her.  She is utterly incapable of managing that child.  If Honora is a complicated mechanism now, what will she be at twenty?  She has elements in her which poor Mary never dreamed of.  I overheard her with Emily, and she talks like a grown-up person.”

Mrs. Hayden’s dimples deepened.

“Better than some grown-up women,” she said.  “She sat in my room while I dressed the other afternoon.  Mrs. Leffingwell had sent her with a note about that French governess.  And, by the way, she speaks French as though she had lived in Paris.”

Little Mrs. Dwyer raised her hands in protest.

“It doesn’t seem natural, somehow.  It doesn’t seem exactly—­moral, my dear.”

“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Hayden.  “Mrs. Leffingwell is only giving the child the advantages which her companions have—­Emily has French, hasn’t she?”

“But Emily can’t speak it—­that way,” said Mrs. Dwyer.  “I don’t blame Mary Leffingwell.  She thinks she is doing her duty, but it has always seemed to me that Honora was one of those children who would better have been brought up on bread and butter and jam.”

“Honora would only have eaten the jam,” said Mrs. Hayden.  “But I love her.”

“I, too, am fond of the child, but I tremble for her.  I am afraid she has that terrible thing which is called temperament.”

George Hanbury made a second heroic rush, and dragged Honora out once more.

“What is this disease you’ve got?” he demanded.

“Disease?” she cried; “I haven’t any disease.”

“Mrs Dwyer says you have temperament, and that it is a terrible thing.”

Honora stopped him in a corner.

“Because people like Mrs. Dwyer haven’t got it,” she declared, with a warmth which George found inexplicable.

“What is it?” he demanded.

“You’ll never know, either, George,” she answered; “it’s soul.”

“Soul!” he repeated; “I have one, and its immortal,” he added promptly.

In the summer, that season of desolation for Honora, when George Hanbury and Algernon Cartwright and other young gentlemen were at the seashore learning to sail boats and to play tennis, Peter Erwin came to his own.  Nearly every evening after dinner, while the light was still lingering under the shade trees of the street, and Aunt Mary still placidly sewing in the wicker chair on the lawn, and Uncle Tom making the tour of flowers with his watering pot, the gate would slam, and Peter’s tall form appear.