"Why, Caspar, I am listening as hard as I can!" exclaimed Miss Brooke, with an injured air. "What do you want?"
"I wish to speak about Lesley."
"Oh, I thought it was Mr. Trent."
"Does it not strike you that he comes here to see Lesley a great deal too often?"
"Rubbish," cried Miss Brooke, pushing up her eyeglasses. "Why, he's engaged to Ethel Kenyon."
"For all that," said Mr. Brooke, and then he paused for a moment. "Did it never strike you that he was here very often?"
"No," said Aunt Sophy, stolidly. "Haven't noticed. I suppose he comes to help Lesley with her singing. Good gracious, Caspar, the girl can take care of herself."
"I dare say she can, but I don't want any trifling—or—or flirtation—to go on," said Brooke, rather sharply. "We are responsible for her, you know: we have to hand her over in good condition, mind and body, at the end of the twelve months. And if you can't look after her, I must get her a companion or something. I've been inclined to come up and play sheep-dog myself, sometimes, when I have heard them practising for an hour together just above my head."
"If they disturb you, Caspar," began Miss Brooke, with real solicitude; but her brother did not allow her to finish her sentence.
"No, no, they don't disturb me—in the way you mean. I confess I should feel more comfortable if I thought that somebody was with the two young people, to play propriety, and all that sort of thing."