said Adrian, "things have pretty well tumbled about our ears this afternoon!  Well, the bottom has been knocked out of the whole show."
Pamela looked from one to the other, she did not ask another question, but her expression did, so Christobel answered:
"Mollie is going up to town this week-end to see her mother about crowds of things.  She believes they’ve taken a cottage on the river just for--well, airing themselves. Mollie says Crown Hill is too far to come for week-ends; it is a long way, we know.  If they have a cottage they can live out of London, and he can go up--I mean Sir Marmaduke can; he can’t get down here, Mollie says--not yet anyway.  The only person who will be here much will be Miss Ashington, and she’ll look after things for Lady Shard, who says she can’t possibly live here and leave Sir Marmaduke in London; besides she wants to present Mollie."
"Present Mollie!" echoed Pamela with awe.  The world was simply changing swiftly.
Mrs. Romilly folded the paper she was reading, and said in her even, restful voice.
"I should have liked to have presented Crow at the same garden-party as Mollie, but it isn’t convenient this year, so we must wait till next summer."
"When Hughie and I are at school," suggested Pamela, a little smile quivering round her firm lips.
Her mother’s eyes smiled back sympathy.
"It’s unlucky for Mollie and Crow not to be together," she said, "but of course Lady Shard wants Mollie and of course she can’t leave Sir Marmaduke alone, so we others must e’en put up with it all.  Something will turn up presently.  I feel it in my bones," said Mrs. Romilly, "and meanwhile don’t let’s cross bridges before we come to them.  I _know_ nothing will be as bad as one fears, it never is."
She looked at Adrian, who made no response.
"Let’s hope," said Crow.
"Has Mollie gone?" asked Pamela, suddenly thinking of an explanation for the motor-car.  She put her foot in it, of course.
"My good girl, do have a grain of sense," begged Adrian, "how could she be gone, when she was out on the _Messenger_ with us till nearly seven o’clock?"
"She goes to-morrow," explained Christobel, "not finally of course.  She comes back about Tuesday--she’s got to pack and take up things Lady Shard wants, you see. Then she’ll go for good--I mean for about six weeks--after that."
Pamela made no comment.  She was trying to fit that car piled with luggage into this sudden development of Bell Bay doings.  Hitherto, the great K.C. and his wife had been to and fro constantly winter as well as summer.  Miss Ashington--commonly called "Auntie A.", as her name was Adelaide Ashington--had been in residence nearly always.  She was Lady Shard’s sister, and a person positively made up of schemes--which never seemed to come off, and were, as a rule, dropped in 

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