“Lewis is a relation as well as a very old friend.  Naturally he is interested.  I should think it could easily be managed.  The boys will go to school, Mrs. M’Cosh will stay on at The Rigs, Jean will see something of the world.  Imagine the joy of taking Jean about!  She will make everything worth while.  I don’t in the least expect her to be what is known as a ‘success.’  I can picture her at a ball thinking of her latter end!  Up-to-date revues she will hate, and I can’t see her indulging in whatever is the latest artistic craze of the moment.  She is a very select little person, Jean.  But she will love the plays and pictures, and shops and sights.  And she has never been abroad—­picture that!  There are worlds of things to show her.  I find that her great desire—­a very modest one—­is to go some April to the Shakespeare Festival at Stratford-on-Avon.  She worships Shakespeare hardly on this side of idolatry.”

“Won’t she be disappointed?  There is nothing very romantic about Stratford of to-day.”

“Ah, but I think I can stage-manage so that it will come up to her expectations.  A great many things in this world need a little stage-management.  Oh, I hope my plans will work out.  I do want Jean.”

“But, Pamela—­I want Jean too.”

Lord Bidborough had risen, and now stood before the fire, his hands in his pockets, his head thrown back, his eyes no longer lazy and amused, but keen and alert.  This was the man who attempted impossible things—­and did them.

It is never an easy moment for a sister when she realises that an adored brother no longer belongs to her.

Pamela, after one startled look at her brother, dropped her eyes and tried to go on with her embroidery, but her hand trembled, and she made stitches at random.

“Pam, dear, you don’t mind?  You don’t think it an unfriendly act?  You will always be Pam, my only sister; someone quite apart.  The new love won’t lessen the old.”

“Ah, my dear”—­Pamela held out her hands to her brother—­“you mustn’t mind if just at first....  You see, it’s a great while ago since the world began, and we’ve been wonderful friends all the time, haven’t we, Biddy?” They sat together silent for a minute, and then Pamela said, “And I’m actually crying, when the thing I most wanted has come to pass:  what an idiot!  Whenever I saw Jean I wanted her for you.  But I didn’t try to work it at all.  It all just happened right, somehow.  Jean’s beauty isn’t for the multitude, nor her charm, and I wondered if she would appeal to you.  You have seen so many pretty girls, and have been almost surfeited with charm, and remained so calm that I wondered if you ever would fall in love.  The ‘manoeuvring mamaws,’ as Bella Bathgate calls the ladies with daughters to marry, quite lost hope where you were concerned; you never seemed to see their manoeuvres, poor dears....  And I was so thankful, for I didn’t want you to marry the modern type of girl....  But I hardly dared to hope you would come to Priorsford and love Jean at sight.  It’s all as simple as a fairy-tale.”