One associates it with such very different speakers; it has such a terrible
canting sound. I hope you will not get into the habit of using it - for your own
sake.«
    »I am not likely to use it much. I suppose I have heard it so often from
Alfred lately. Please don't think,« she added rather hastily, »that I have
become a Socialist. Indeed, I dislike the name; I find it implies so many things
that I could never approve of.«
    Her way of speaking the last sentence would have amused a dispassionate
critic, it was so distinctively the tone of Puritan maidenhood. From lips like
Adela's it is delicious to hear such moral babbling. Oh, the gravity of
conviction in a white-souled English girl of eighteen! Do you not hear her say
those words: »things that I could never approve of«?
    As her companion did not immediately reply, she again raised the field-glass
to her eyes and swept the prospect.
    »Can you see your brother on the road?« Hubert inquired.
    »No, not yet. There is a trap driving this way. Why, Alfred is sitting in
it! Oh, it is Mr. Mutimer's trap I see. He must have met Alfred at the station
and have given him a ride.«
    »Evidently they are great friends,« commented Eldon.
    Adela did not reply. After gazing a little longer, she said -
    »He will be home before I can get there.«
    She screwed up the glasses and turned as if to take leave. But Hubert
prepared to walk by her side, and together they reached the lane.
    »Now I am going to run down the hill,« Adela said, laughing. »I can't ask
you to join in such childishness, and I suppose you are not going this way,
either?«
    »No, I am walking back to the Manor,« the other replied soberly. »We had
better say good-bye. On Monday we shall leave Wanley, my mother and I.«
    »On Monday?«
    The girl became graver.
    »But only to go to Agworth?« she added.
    »I shall not remain at Agworth. I am going to London.«
    »To - to study?«
    »Something or other, I don't quite know what. Good-bye!«
    »Won't you come to say good-bye to us - to mother?«
    »Shall you be at home to-morrow afternoon
