moment's greeting. Gault did not see as much of his brother's household as formerly. They knew of Viola Reed's disappearance; and Letitia from delicacy and Maud from a sense of guilty embarrassment refrained from urging him to reëstablish himself on the old footing of careless intimacy.
He said now, in response to Letitia's query why he absented himself so much, that he was getting old and had to go to bed early. "For beauty sleep, you know," he added, looking at her with his eyes smiling behind his glasses. "You don't need that, do you, Tishy? Hullo, there 's the rain!"
The first drops, swollen, slow, and reluctant, spotted the pavement. The air felt curiously damp, and had a languid softness in its touch.
Letitia looked up at the low-hanging clouds, and a drop fell on her cheek.
"Yes, there it is," she said. "Get in the carriage and come home to dinner, John. No one will be there—just ourselves."
He said he had an engagement for dinner.
"Well, then, get in the carriage and drive with me down to South Park, where I have a message to give a scrub-woman. I 've got something I want to say to you."
He obediently entered, and the coachman turned the horses' heads in the direction of South Park.
