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could put up a fight to keep him, couldn’t you?”
    “Y—yes . ..”
    “It all depends,” Lady Merrick expounded briskly, “on how much he means to you, my dear. Tell me — how much does he mean?”
    Alix hesitated.
    “I’m not quite sure,” she said slowly. “I’ve been asking myself that question during the night, and honestly I don’t know the answer. You see, I haven’t seen him for two years.”
    “Two years too long.”
    “Perhaps. But you see, Aunt Drusilla—during those two years, everything I’ve thought done and—and felt has been based on the certainty that I was in love with Bernard, and he with me; and that I was going to marry him. If I’m not, I’ll feel that in a sense I’ve thrown away those two years—lost them out of my life.”
    Her aunt blew a smoke ring. She said cheerfully, with a fond look at her niece’s downcast face, “They’re not lost, my dear, whatever comes of them. No experience of that kind—loving, feeling deeply, hoping—is a loss. But you’re both young. And you’ve got to face the fact that young people’s ideas—and tastes—can change a lot in two years.”
    “Mine haven’t changed,” Alix protested. “I’ve never even thought of changing.”
    “No. But you’re the steadfast type my dear.” Seeing the real trouble and perplexity in her niece’s big brown eyes she added: “You know, don’t you, dear, that you are more than welcome to live with me here for just as long as you like?”
    Alix smiled her gratitude.
    “I know, darling,” she said in her warm voice. “And I will stay with you—I suppose I can find a job—?—If ... if things go wrong. But...”
    Lady Merrick, stubbing out her cigarette, waited with unaccustomed patience while her niece sought for words.
    “But I can’t just take all this for granted. I can’t just leave things in the air. Either I’m engaged to Bernard and going to be married soon, or I’m not. The thing is, don’t you see?—I must know”
    “Of course.” Lady Merrick fitted another cigarette into her long amber holder and waited again. When at length Alix spoke, there was a flush of embarrassment on her face.
    “I’m afraid you’re going to think me terribly ungrateful, after inviting me here and paying my fare and everything—but Aunt Drusilla, I think I must fly up to Salisbury right away, as soon as I can get a seat on a plane. I simply can’t stay on here, trying to enjoy this heavenly place, when all the time my future may be in ruins.”
    Meeting her aunt’s eye at that point, she gave a shaky laugh.
    “It sounds like something in a melodrama, put that way, doesn’t it? But—you do see, don’t you?”
    “Of course I see,” Lady Merrick agreed warmly, hiding her own disappointment. “I have to go in to Edward this morning. We could go in to the travel bureau and see about your passage right away, if that’s what you’d like.”
    Alix jumped up and kissed her aunt’s rather leathery cheek. Next to Bernard and Mummy and Daphne, she thought, she really is the nicest person in the world. “And you don’t think me a snake?”
    “No, I don’t think you a snake. I think, if you want to know, that you’re being rather sensible and practical about the whole thing. You’re going to see Bernard, I take it, and give him a chance to ...”
    “I shan’t say a thing,” Alix broke in. “I shan’t refer to the letter except to say how sorry I am about the farm. I shall just give him a chance to—to come clean, if he wants to. And then I shall fade away.”
    “ If he seems to want you to.”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “Did you answer the letter?”
    “Not yet.”
    “Then don’t,” Lady Merrick advised. “Send a cable, ARRIVING SUCH AND SUCH A DATE, PLEASE MEET. You can do it when you’ve booked your seat. Much the best way.”
    Alix agreed. She had been thinki ng what a difficult letter it was going to be to write. A cable would be so much simpler; besides, it would leave Bernard