young men. She loved Johnny with special affection besides — a childless woman's regard for the only piece of lusty youth that she might consider as belonging to her. As for him — ^well, the young man was not given to introspection; could hardly be said, indeed, at this twenty-fourth year of his life, to think much more than does a healthy dog. But if his reflections could have been analyzed, they would have been found to run in some such guise: "It's jolly lonely for the poor old girl, after all! And it's worth being stuffed for a bit to see her so awfully bucked up! . . . .Daresay she'll hook on to somebody and let me get away. . . Ripping to-day under the trees, with a pretty girl, strawberries, cymbals and all that."
The car duly wheeled in between the great guardant lions into the cedar avenue which is the most noted feature of Warborough House park. Sir John Holdfast, the crook of his cane to his lips, gazed contentedly out across the shadows of the avenue upon the golden green spaces beyond. A curve of the road brought them in view of the terraces and the noble pillared house. A vision bright with colour; from the stone vases blazing with geraniums to the delicate tints of dresses and parasols in the shifting crowd and the subdued glory of the rose arches against the green lawns. A vagrant gust of music caught his ear. He felt an odd stir within him; something like the tingle of excitement with which his blood was wont to greet the first cry of the hounds on a hunting morn.
Lady Caroline, reminiscing beside him upon her initial garden party at Warborough, rambled on unheeded:
