Her father would be the same again, with his old good-humor and criticism of her enthusiasms, his old interest in things and people, his old comradeship for her.

John Kendal would have married Elfrida Bell-- what an idyll they would make of life together!--and she, Janet, would have accepted the situation.

Her interest in the prospective pleasures on which Lady Halifax expatiated was slight; she was obliged to speculate upon its rising, which she did with all the confidence she could command.

She declined absolutely to read Bryce's "American Commonwealth," or Miss Bird's account of the Rocky Mountains, or anybody's travels in the Orient, upon all of which Miss Halifax had painstakingly fixed her attention; but one afternoon she ordered a blue serge travelling-dress and refused one or two literary, engagements for the present, and the next day wrote to Lady Halifax that she had decided to go.

Her father received her decision with more relief than he meant to show, and Janet had a bitter half-hour over it.