“Miss Brandt?” said Mr. Pixley vaguely, as though the name were new and strange to him.  Or perhaps it was an endeavour on his part to express the impassable gulf which lay between his visitor and his ward, and the profound amazement he felt at any attempt on his visitor’s part to abridge it.  He also made a little involuntary preliminary cut at him with the pince-nez, as much as to say, “If this my weapon were of a size commensurate with my wishes and your colossal impudence, your head would lie upon the ground, young man.”

“I have had the pleasure of meeting Miss Brandt at Lady Elspeth Gordon’s and elsewhere.  I think I may claim that we were on terms of friendship.  Lady Elspeth has been called from home very suddenly to the bedside of her niece, Lady Assynt, and I have written twice to Miss Brandt and have had no reply.  It struck me that she might be ill and I have called to inquire.”

This was all lame enough no doubt, and so he felt it, but it was only in the nature of preliminary feinting.  They were not yet at grips.

“Ah!” with ponderous deliberation, “you have called to inquire if Miss Brandt is ill.  I have pleasure in informing you that she is not.”

“I am glad to hear that, at all events.  Might I ask if you are aware of any reason why she should not have received my letters—­or replied to them?”

“Two questions,” said Mr. Pixley, cutting them in slices with his pince-nez, as though they were to be charged up to his visitor at so much per pound.  “There is no reason whatever why Miss Brandt should not have received your letters.  There may be the best possible reasons why she should not reply to them.”

“So far as I have been able to form an opinion of Miss Brandt it is quite unlike her not to have, at all events, acknowledged them.”

“Ah!  Your opportunities have probably been limited, Mr.—­er—­“—­with a glance at the card—­“Graeme, and you may possibly be—­from your calling upon me I judge you undoubtedly are—­ignorant of the facts of the case,” and the gold pince-nez hammered that into the stolid young man’s head.

“Perhaps you would be so good as to enlighten me.”

“It would perhaps be as well to do so.  To be perfectly frank with you, Mr. Graeme, my ward had the very best of reasons for handing your letters to me and not replying to them herself.”

“Really!  I would esteem it a favour, Mr. Pixley, if you would enlighten me further.”

“Certainly!” with an airy wave of the pince-nez.  “I intend to do so.  The simple fact of my ward’s engagement to my son, and that they are looking forward to the celebration of their marriage in something less than three months, will probably suffice to explain Miss Brandt’s disinclination to enter into correspondence with a comparative stranger,”—­and the pince-nez shredded Graeme’s hopes into little pieces and scattered them about the floor.

“Miss Brandt is engaged to your son?” he jerked, feeling not a little foolish, and decidedly downhearted.