Cynthia gave him a quick look.

"You have a right to ask," she said, in a lower voice. "I suppose I ought to tell you the whole story; but----"

There was strong reluctance in her voice.

"You need do nothing of the kind. I have no right at all; don't talk nonsense, Cynthia. After all, what is the use of raking up old reminiscences? I have always held that it is better to put the past behind us--to live for the present and the future. All of us have memories that we would gladly forget. Why not make it a business of life to do so?"

"'Forgetting those things which are behind,'" Cynthia murmured.

She was sitting on a very low chair, her hands loosely clasped before her, her eyes searching the embers of the fire. Hubert looked at her curiously.

"I never heard you quote Scripture before," he said, half laughing.

"Why not? There are plenty of things in the Bible worth thinking about and quoting too," said Cynthia briskly, but with a sudden change of attitude. "It would be better for us both, I have no doubt, if we knew it a little better, Mr. Lepel. Aren't you going to smoke? It does not seem at all natural to see you without a cigar in your mouth."

"What a character to give me! Smoke in this rose-tinted room?"

"Madame's friends all smoke here. You need not be an exception. She herself condescends at times to the luxury of a cigarette."

"You call it a luxury?"

"Certainly. Madame has initiated me. But you will understand that I don't display my accomplishment to every one."

"No--don't," said Hubert, a trifle gravely.

She looked round at him with a pretty defiance in her eyes and a laugh upon her face.

"Don't you approve?" she said mockingly. "Ah, you have yet something to learn! It is quite evident that you have been spending Easter in the country, and its gentle dulness hangs about you still."

"Gentle dulness!" Hubert thought involuntarily of Enid. Yes, the term fitted her very well. Timid, gentle, dull--thus unjustly he thought of her; while, as to Cynthia--whatever Cynthia's faults might be, she was not dull--a great virtue in Hubert's eyes.

"I think you could make me approve of anything you do," he said, as he rose in obedience to her invitation to light his cigar. "Some people have the grace of becomingness; they adorn all they touch."

"What a magnificent compliment! I will immediately put it to the test,"

said Cynthia lightly. She had also risen, and was examining a little silver box on the mantelpiece. "Here Madame keeps her Russian cigarettes," she said. "I have not set up a stock of my own, you see.

Now give me a light. There--I can do it quite skilfully!" she said, as she placed one of the tiny _papelitos_ between her lips and gave one or two dainty puffs. "Now does it become me?"

"Excellent well!" said Hubert, who was leaning back in an enormous chair, so long and deep that one lay rather than sat in it, and regarding her with amusement. "'All what you do, fair creature, still betters what is done.'"

"Then I'm content," said Cynthia, seating herself and holding the cigarette lightly between her fingers.

She still kept it alight by an occasional little puff; but Hubert smiled to see that her enjoyment of it was, as a humorist has said of his first cigar, "purely of an intellectual kind." She enjoyed doing what was unusual and _bizarre_--that was all. He wondered whence she sprang, this brilliant creature of earth with instincts so keen, desires so ardent, mind and imagination so much more fully developed than was usual with girls of her age. Cynthia's beauty was undeniable; but even without beauty, save that of youth, she would have been striking and remarkable.

She was not conscious of his continued gaze at her; she seemed to be lost in thought--perhaps of her earlier years, for presently she said in a reflective tone--

"You were surprised at my quoting Scripture. I wonder why? I do not seem such a bad person that I must not quote the Bible, do I?"

"Certainly not."

"I used to be at the head of the Bible-class always when I was at St.

Elizabeth's," she said dreamily. She did not notice that Hubert gave a little start when he heard the name.

"Your school was called St. Elizabeth's?"

"Yes."

"At East Winstead?"

"Yes"--this time rather hesitatingly. "Why?"

"Did you happen to know a girl called Jane Wood?"

The two looked at each other steadily for a minute or two. Hubert had spoken with resolute quietness; he thought that Cynthia's expression hardened, and that her color failed a little as she replied--

"I remember her quite well. She ran away."

"Before you left?"

"Before I left," said the girl, looking down at the cigarette she had taken from her lips and held between her fingers. Suddenly she threw it into the fire, and sitting erect, while a hot flush crossed her face, went on, "Why do you want to know?"

"Oh, nothing! What sort of a girl she was, for instance."

"A wild little creature--a horrid, ungrateful, bad-tempered girl!

They--we were all glad when she went."

"Why, the old woman--what's her name?--Sister Louisa--said that she was a general favorite!"

"I'm sure she wasn't. When were you there?"

"The day after her departure, I think."

"And what took you there, Mr. Lepel?" There was a touch of bewilderment in Cynthia's voice.

"Curiosity, for the most part."

"No one was at the school whom you knew, I suppose?"

"No," said Hubert, reflecting that Jane Wood had gone before he paid his visit.

Perhaps Cynthia did not understand this point. At any rate, she looked relieved.

"I was glad when my time came to leave," she said more freely.

"Did you not like the place?"

"Pretty well. It was frightfully, awfully dull!"

"And yet you had never known anything more exciting? Were you really conscious at the time that it was dull, or did you realise its dulness only afterwards?"