‘I have no idea,’ said her sister.  ‘Surely,’ she added, her face intensifying to a wan sadness, ‘Mr. Julian has not been here?’

‘Yes,’ said Picotee.  ’And we went down to the sands—­he, and Myrtle, and Georgina, and Emmeline, and I—­and Cornelia came down when she had put away the dinner.  And then we dug wriggles out of the sand with Myrtle’s spade:  we got such a lot, and had such fun; they are in a dish in the kitchen.  Mr. Julian came to see you; but at last he could wait no longer, and when I told him you were at the meeting in the castle ruins he said he would try to find you there on his way home, if he could get there before the meeting broke up.’

‘Then it was he I saw far away on the road—­yes, it must have been.’  She remained in gloomy reverie a few moments, and then said, ’Very well—­let it be.  Picotee, get me some tea:  I do not want dinner.’

But the news of Christopher’s visit seemed to have taken away her appetite for tea also, and after sitting a little while she flung herself down upon the couch, and told Picotee that she had settled to go and see their aunt Charlotte.

‘I am going to write to Sol and Dan to ask them to meet me there,’ she added.  ’I want them, if possible, to see Paris.  It will improve them greatly in their trades, I am thinking, if they can see the kinds of joinery and decoration practised in France.  They agreed to go, if I should wish it, before we left London.  You, of course, will go as my maid.’

Picotee gazed upon the sea with a crestfallen look, as if she would rather not cross it in any capacity just then.

‘It would scarcely be worth going to the expense of taking me, would it?’ she said.

The cause of Picotee’s sudden sense of economy was so plain that her sister smiled; but young love, however foolish, is to a thinking person far too tragic a power for ridicule; and Ethelberta forbore, going on as if Picotee had not spoken:  ’I must have you with me.  I may be seen there:  so many are passing through Rouen at this time of the year.  Cornelia can take excellent care of the children while we are gone.  I want to get out of England, and I will get out of England.  There is nothing but vanity and vexation here.’

‘I am sorry you were away when he called,’ said Picotee gently.

’O, I don’t mean that.  I wish there were no different ranks in the world, and that contrivance were not a necessary faculty to have at all.  Well, we are going to cross by the little steamer that puts in here, and we are going on Monday.’  She added in another minute, ’What had Mr. Julian to tell us that he came here?  How did he find us out?’

’I mentioned that we were coming here in my letter to Faith.  Mr. Julian says that perhaps he and his sister may also come for a few days before the season is over.  I should like to see Miss Julian again.  She is such a nice girl.’

‘Yes.’  Ethelberta played with her hair, and looked at the ceiling as she reclined.  ‘I have decided after all,’ she said, ’that it will be better to take Cornelia as my maid, and leave you here with the children.  Cornelia is stronger as a companion than you, and she will be delighted to go.  Do you think you are competent to keep Myrtle and Georgina out of harm’s way?’