allowed very few to pass the line which divides the stream of acquaintanceship from the deep waters of friendship.

There are, and always will be, some people who display to the world a formidable aspect, as it were a stone wall with a bristling row of broken bottles on the top, or an ugly notice board with injunctions, such as "Strictly Private," or "Keep off the Grass," but Philippa was not one of these. You might wander in her company along paths of pleasant conversation, through a garden where bloomed bright flowers of intelligence and humour, and it was only afterwards that you realised what in the enjoyment of the moment you had failed to notice, namely, that inside the garden a high hedge, which had appeared merely a pleasing background for the flowers, had completely hidden the part you most particularly wished to see, and that the paths had brought you out at the exact spot where you entered.

It was just because this hedge of gentle reticence denied to a curious mob admission to the inner sanctuary of her thoughts, that they designated her as "odd." They found it impossible to know just what she meant and felt and thought. In their own parlance "they got no further." But it must be added that no one attempted to deny the existence of the inner sanctuary.

In spite of this rather tantalising trait in her character she was popular—every one liked her, for her natural kindness of heart, combined with great charm of manner and more than ordinary good looks, made her gladly welcome wherever she went.

She was an excellent person to confide in, for she accepted the confidences of other women with sympathetic and frequently helpful interest; but when it came to returning those confidences—well, that was quite a different matter.

In her life Philippa had possessed few intimate friends, and the chief of them had been her father. From him she had inherited, with her dark hair and straight eyebrows, a certain direct outlook on life. It was not an attitude of superiority or even of conscious criticism, but more an instinct for the people and things which were, as she expressed it, "worth while," a keen desire for the very best, and a preference for doing without should that best be unobtainable.

Mr. Harford understood as did no one else the depth of pity and the enormous capacity for affection in the heart of his child, and had from her earliest youth striven to inculcate self-reliance and thoughtfulness. "Most women are frivolous and empty-headed fools," he would assert hotly, "with no strength of mind, and no notion of playing the game;" and yet, by one of those inexplicable contradictions with which men of his type so frequently give the lie to their expressed opinions, he had married a woman in whom the attributes he professed to admire were conspicuously lacking.

Graceful, charming, and extraordinarily attractive, but with no thought beyond the pleasures of the moment, Mrs. Harford fluttered through life like a butterfly.

Mr. Harford's diplomatic appointments had necessitated their living abroad, and for a surprising number of years his wife had been one of the acknowledged beauties of Europe. No one could have been prouder of her than was her husband, who was always her foremost and most devoted admirer. For him, her beauty and her charm never waned, and to the day of his death, which occurred some three years before my story opens, he had regarded her as a most precious possession, to be gazed at, caressed and guarded, if hardly to be depended on. For her part she returned him all the affection of which she was capable.

At the age of fourteen Philippa had been sent to school in England, and when she returned to her parents, who were then living in Berlin, the tender intimacy which had existed between father and daughter had lost nothing by absence, and their mutual devotion increased day by day.

It was soon after that a certain episode happened which, slight as it was, must be recorded, as it was not without effect on Philippa's development.

A man, attracted by the freshness and originality of the young girl, and possibly piqued by the fact that she gave him no encouragement, declared his affection and set himself deliberately to gain hers in return.

This was not to be done in a day, and presently his fickle fancy found a new attraction and he wearied of the game. His marriage with another woman came as a surprise to the community, who had been watching the affair with the usual interest evinced in such matters, and much indignation was expressed at his behaviour. There had been no engagement—it is doubtful if Philippa's heart had really been touched—but his protestations of devotion had been fervent and she had believed him, and her trust in her fellow-creatures suffered a shock.

It was unfortunate that Mr. Harford, with all his love for his child, had been unable to guard her from the experience, which could not fail to be hurtful to one of her over-sensitive nature, but he had been absent on a special mission at the time. Philippa's attitude towards the world in general, and towards men in particular, was changed; it became one of amused toleration. Men were interesting, certainly, and pleasant companions, but were not to be taken seriously or to be believed in.

Since then several eligible suitors had presented themselves, but they had never succeeded in convincing Philippa of their sincerity, and Mrs. Harford, whose idea of a good mother was one who successfully married off her daughter in her first, or at least her second, season, was doomed to disappointment.

Since her father's death Philippa had been with her mother, living in Paris, or Dresden, or on the Riviera, as the elder lady's wayward mind directed. Mrs. Harford, who had mourned her husband with all sincerity for longer than her friends anticipated, had recently married again. Philippa had just bade good-bye to the bridal pair, and seen them start off on their journey to St. Petersburg, where her stepfather, who was, as her father had been, in the Diplomatic Service, was attached to the Embassy as First Secretary.

She had no anxiety with regard to her mother's choice, nor fortunately did she feel any resentment that her beloved father should have been so easily replaced in her mother's affections. She realised clearly that Mrs. Harford, or, as we should call her now, Lady Lawson, having all her life depended absolutely on a man's care, was lost and unhappy without it, and she could only feel grateful that her choice had fallen on a man entirely able to give her all she wanted, and, so far as the future could be foretold, to make her life happy.

At all events her mother would continue in the same surroundings that she had enjoyed for many years, and in a position which she would undoubtedly fill to her own and every one else's satisfaction.

To be honest, Philippa, although fond of her mother, had found the last year or two very trying. For some time after her father's death their mutual grief and loss had drawn the two near together, but as Mrs. Harford's powers of enjoyment and her love of excitement reasserted themselves, Philippa had discovered that she was quite uninterested in her mother's pleasures, and that they had very little in common.

A constant round of gaiety such as the older woman revelled in was quite unsatisfying to her daughter. In consequence the girl was really lonely. She had not yet found an outlet for her desire to be of some use in the world, or to fill the void left by the loss of her father's constant companionship.

But just at this moment she was enjoying a certain sense of freedom which the shifting of the responsibility of her mother on to stronger shoulders had given her. She had, owing to the circumstances I have related, seen very little of her native country, although she had travelled widely on the Continent and in more distant lands, and she anticipated with keen enjoyment the visit she was about to pay to a friend who lived in the east of England.

This friend had been a