"That is a great consideration," Sybil said, earnestly. "I shall always be thankful that I met Mr. Brooks. He made me think in a practical way about things which have always troubled me a little. I should hate to seem thoughtless or ungrateful to him. Will you tell me something, mother?" Of course."

"Do you think that he cares--at all?"

I think he does--a little!

"Enough to be reconciled with his father for my sake?"

"No! Not enough for that," Lady Caroom answered.

Sybil drew a little breath.

"I think," she said, "that that decides me."

The long ascent was over at last. They pulled up before the inn, in front of which the proprietor was already executing a series of low bows. Before they could descend there was a familiar sound from behind, and a young man, in a grey flannel suit and Panama hat, jumped from his motor and came to the carriage door.

"Don't be awfully cross!" he exclaimed, laughing. "You know you half promised to come with me this afternoon, so I couldn't help having a spin out to see whether I could catch you up. Won't you allow me, Lady Caroom? The step is a little high."

"It isn't any use being cross with you," Sybil remarked. "It never seems to make any impression."

"I am terribly thick-skimmed," he answered, "when I don't want to understand. Will you ladies have some tea, or come and see how the restoration is getting on?"

"We were proposing to go and see what the German Emperor's idea of a Roman camp was," Sybil answered.

"Oh, you can't shake me off now, can you, Lady Caroom?" he declared, appealing to her. "We'll consider it an accident that you found me here, if you like, but it is in reality a great piece of good fortune for you."

"And why, may I ask?" Sybil inquired, with uplifted eyebrows.

"Oh, I'm an authority on this place--come here nearly every day to give the director, as he calls himself, some hints. Come along, Lady Caroom.

I'll show you the baths and the old part of the outer wall."

Lady Caroom very soon had enough of it. She sat down upon a tree and brought out her sketchbook.

"Give me a quarter of an hour, please," she begged, "not longer. I want to be home for tea."

They strolled off, Atherstone turning a little nervously to Sybil.

"I say, we've seen the best part of the ruins," he remarked. "The renovation's hideous. Let's go in the wood--and I'll show you a squirrel's nest."

Sybil hesitated. Her thoughts for a moment were in confusion. Then she sighed once and turned towards the wood.

"I have never seen a squirrel's nest," she said. "Is it far?"

Lady Caroom put her sketch away as she heard their approaching footsteps, and looked up. Atherstone's happiness was too ridiculously apparent. He came straight over to her.

"You'll give her to me, won't you?" he exclaimed. "'Pon my word, she shall be the happiest woman in England if I can make her so. I'm perfectly certain I'm the happiest man."

Lady Caroom pressed her daughter's hand, and they all turned to descend the hill.

"Of course I'm charmed," Lady Caroom said. "Sybil makes me feel so elderly. But I don't know what I shall do for a chaperon now."

Atherstone laughed.

"I'm your son-in-law," he said. "I can take you out."

Sybil shook her head.

"No, you won't," she declared. "The only woman I have ever been really jealous of is mother. She has a way of absorbing all the attention from every one when she is around. I'm not going to have her begin with you."

"I feel," Atherstone said, "like the man who married a twin--said he never tried to tell the difference, you know, when a pal asked him how he picked out his own wife."

"If you think," Sybil said, severely, "that you have made any arrangements of that sort I take it all back. You are going to marry me, if you behave yourself."

He sighed.

"Three months is a beastly long time," he said.

Lady Caroom drove back alone. The motor whizzed by her half-way down the hill--Sybil holding her hat with both hands, her hair blowing about, and her cheeks pink with pleasure. She waved her hand gaily as she went by, and then clutched her hat again. Lady Caroom watched them till they were out of sight, then she found herself looking steadfastly across the valley to the dark belt of pine-clad hills beyond. She could see nothing very clearly, and there was a little choking in her throat.

They were both there, father and son. Once she fancied that at last he was holding out his arms towards her--she sat up in the carriage with a little cry which was half a sob. When she drove through the hotel gates it was he who stood upon the steps to welcome her.

CHAPTER XI

BROOKS HEARS THE NEWS

Unchanged! Her first eager glance into his face told her that. Waxen white, his lips smiled their courteous greeting upon her, his tone was measured and cold as ever. She set her teeth as she rose from her seat, and gathered her skirts in her hand.

"You, too, a pilgrim?" she exclaimed. "I thought you preferred salt water."

"We had a pleasant fortnight's yachting," he answered. "Then I went with Hennibul to Wiesbaden, and I came on here to see you.

"Have you met Sybil and Atherstone?" she asked him.

"Yes," he answered, gravely.

"Come into my room," she said, "and I will give you some tea. These young people are sure to have it on the terrace. I will join you when I have got rid of some of this dust."

He was alone for ten minutes. At the end of that time she came out through the folding-doors with the old smile upon her lips and the old lithesomeness in her movements. He rose and watched her until she had settled down in her low chair.

"So Sybil is going to marry Atherstone!"

"Yes. He really deserves it, doesn't he? He is a very nice boy."

Arranmore shrugged his shoulders.

"What an everlasting fool Brooks is," he said, in a low tone.

"He keeps his word," she answered. "It is a family trait with you, Arranmore. You are all stubborn, all self-willed, self-centred, selfish!"