"Yes, that's it, that's just right!" they heard her exclaim. "She stood in the middle of the room and"—Harry pressed his wife's hand and laughed silently—"she cried out just what you've read. I remember exactly how she looked and the very words that Mr Cholderton uses. 'Think of the difference it makes, the enormous difference!' she said. Oh, it might have been yesterday, Mr Neeld!"
Harry leapt over the window-sill and burst into the room with a laugh.
"Oh, you dear silly people, you're at it again!" said he.
"The story does not lose its interest for me," remarked old Mr Neeld primly, and he added, as he greeted Cecily, "It won't so long as I can look at your face, my dear. You keep Addie Tristram still alive for me."
"She's Lady Tristram—and I'm the enormous difference, I suppose," said Harry.
Mina and Neeld did not quite understand why Cecily turned so suddenly and put her hand in Harry's, saying, "No, Harry, there's no difference now."
Meanwhile, down in Blentmouth, Miss Swinkerton looked up from the local paper and remarked across the table to Mrs Trumbler:
"Here's an announcement that Lady Tristram will give a ball at Blent in January. You'll remember that I told you that two months ago, Mrs Trumbler."
"Yes, Miss Swinkerton, but that was before all the——"