“I should have thought him to have had a good memory,” she said.

“I have always been led to believe that he was once sent away from college in his youth,—­for his health,” he explained significantly.  “No man has a good memory who can’t remember that.  Perhaps the battle of Gettysburg wiped it out.”

Thus, in his own easy-going fashion, Mr. Pembroke sought to distract her.  She put on a hat, and they walked about, the various scenes recalling incidents of holidays he had spent at Highlawns.  And after a while Honora was thankful that chance had sent her in this hour to him rather than to Mrs. Kame.  For the sight, that morning of this lady in her dressing-gown over the stairway, had seemingly set the seal on a growing distaste.  Her feeling had not been the same about Mrs. Rindge:  Mrs. Kame’s actions savoured of deliberate choice, of an inherent and calculating wickedness.

Had the distraction of others besides himself been the chief business of Mr. Pembroke’s life, he could not have succeeded better that afternoon.  He must be given this credit:  his motives remain problematical; at length he even drew laughter from her.  The afternoon wore on, they returned to the garden for tea, and a peaceful stillness continued to reign about them, the very sky smiling placidly at her fears.  Not by assuring her that Hugh was unusual horseman, that he had passed through many dangers beside which this was a bagatelle, could the student of the feminine by her side have done half so well.  And it may have been that his success encouraged him as he saw emerging, as the result of his handiwork, an unexpectedly attractive—­if still somewhat serious-woman from the gloom that had enveloped her.  That she should still have her distrait moments was but natural.

He talked to her largely about Hugh, of whom he appeared sincerely fond.  The qualities which attracted Mr. Pembroke in his own sex were somewhat peculiar, and seemingly consisted largely in a readiness to drop the business at hand, whatever it might be, at the suggestion of a friend to do something else; the “something else,” of course, to be the conception of an ingenious mind.  And it was while he was in the midst of an anecdote proving the existence of this quality in his friend that he felt a sudden clutch on his arm.

They listened.  Faintly, very faintly, could be heard the sound of hoof beats; rapid, though distant.

“Do you hear?” she whispered, and still held his arm.

“It’s just like them to race back,” said Pembroke, with admirable nonchalance.

“But they wouldn’t come back at this time—­it’s too early.  Hugh always takes long rides.  They started for Hubbard’s—­it’s twelve miles.”

“Adele changes her mind every minute of the day,” he said.

“Listen!” she cried, and her clutch tightened.  The hoof beats grew louder.  “It’s only one—­it’s only one horse!”