“Ulfar has five senses. Ulfar is very fond of himself. He will leave Redware, of course. How handsome Brune Anneys is!”

“Will you coax him to leave to-night?”

“Ulfar? Yes, I will; for it is the proper thing for him to do. It would be a shame to bring his quarrels to your house.—What a splendid rider! Look, Elizabeth, he is just topping the hill! I do believe he turned his head! Is he not handsome? 158 Apollo! Antinoüs! Pshaw! Brune Anneys is a great deal more human, and a great deal more godlike, than either.”

158

“Do not be silly, Sarah. And do occupy yourself a little with Ulfar now.”

“When the hour comes, I will. Ulfar is evidently occupying himself at present in watching his wife. There is a decorous naughtiness and a stimulating sense of danger about seeing Aspatria, that must be a thorough enjoyment to Ulfar.”

“Men are always in fusses. Ulfar has kept my heart palpitating ever since he could walk alone.”

Sarah sighed. “It is very difficult,” she said, “to decide whether very old men or very young men can be the greater trial. The suffering both can cause is immense! Poor Sandys was sixty-six, and Ulfar is thirty-six, and—” She shook her head, and sighed again.

“How hateful country-people are!” exclaimed Elizabeth. “They must talk, no matter what tragedy they cause with their scandalous words.”

159

“Are they worse than our own set, either in town or country? You know what the Countess of Denbigh considered pleasant conversation?—telling things that ought not to be told.”

“The Countess is a wretch! she would tell the most sacred of secrets.”

“I tell secrets also. I do not consider it wrong. What business has any one to throw the onus of keeping their secret on my shoulders? Why should they expect from me more prudence than they themselves have shown?”

“That is true. But in these valleys they speak so uncomfortably direct; nothing but the strongest, straightest, most definite words will be used.”

“That is a pity. People ought to send scandal through society in a respectable hunt-the-slipper form of circulation. But that is a kind of decency to be cultivated. However, I shall tell Ulfar, in the plainest words I can find, that there will 

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