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 again. She felt her mouth twitching into a smile, and said, firmly, "It makes me terribly unhappy."

"It seems to," said Uncle Johnnie.

"No, but it really does! What's the matter with Nick? When you think how wonderful she is, and yet she's so unspoiled! She treats us all as if we were just as wonderful!"

"She does still permit us to turn our backs when we leave the presence chamber."

Ellen was horrified, and yet he made her laugh. "Oh, you don't understand her, either," she said. But she couldn't help liking him.

I hate him, Christabel thought, going to her workroom after talking to Nick Portal. No, I don't, I don't waste that much emotion on him—it's simply that he bores me excruciatingly. Poor foolish little Ellen! What does she see in him?

He had come just after Christabel had sent Ellen to see Uncle Johnnie. Christabel, going through the hall, had heard him tell Smedley