But Blanche Farrow had been firm.  Sir Lyon must of course be on her own right hand, Mr. Burnaby on her left.  It is always difficult to arrange a party of four ladies and five men.  She had suggested more than one other pleasant woman to make up the party to ten, but Varick had had some objection to each—­the objection usually taking the line that the person proposed would not “get on” with the Burnabys.

Blanche again wondered why their host had been so determined to have Helen Brabazon at his first house-party, if her coming meant the inclusion of her tiresome uncle and aunt?  And then she felt a little ashamed of herself.  One of the best points about Lionel Varick was his sense of gratitude to anyone who had done him a good turn.  Gratitude had been the foundation of their own now many-year-long friendship.

The food was so very good, there was so much of it, and doubtless those who had journeyed down to Wyndfell Hall to-night were all so hungry, that there was rather less talk going on round the table than might have been expected.  But now and again the hostess caught a fleeting interchange of words.  She heard, for instance, old Miss Burnaby informing young Donnington that she had been a good deal on the Continent as a young woman, and had actually spent a year in Austria a matter of forty years ago.

As the meal went on, Miss Farrow gradually became aware that Bubbles provided what life and soul there was in the dull party.  But for Bubbles, but for her infectious high spirits and vitality, how very heavy and stupid the meal they were now ending would have been!  She asked herself, for perhaps the twentieth time in the last three-quarters of an hour, why her friend had brought together such a curious and ill-assorted set of people.

At last she looked across at Miss Burnaby, and gradually everyone got up.

Varick was at the door in a moment, holding it open, and, as they filed by him, managing to say a word to each of the four ladies.  “Bravo, Bubbles!” Blanche heard him whisper.  “You’re earning your Christmas present right royally!” and the girl’s eyes flashed up into her host’s with a mischievous, not over-friendly glance.  Miss Farrow was aware that Bubbles did not much care for Lionel Varick.  She rather wondered why.  But she was far too shrewd not to know that there’s no accounting either for likings or dislikings where a man and a woman are concerned.

As she shepherded her little party across the staircase lobby, she managed to mutter into her niece’s ear:  “I want you to take on Miss Burnaby for me, Bubbles—­I’m anxious to make friends with Helen Brabazon.”

There are times when what one must call for want of a better term the social rites of existence interfere most unwarrantably with the elemental happenings of life.  But on this first evening at Wyndfell Hall the coming of coffee and of liqueurs proved a welcome diversion.  Miss Burnaby smiled a pleased smile as she sipped the Benedictine which a footman had poured into a tall green-and-gold Bohemian liqueur-glass for her.  She, at any rate, was enjoying her visit.  And so, Blanche Farrow decided, was the old lady’s niece, for “How beautiful and perfect everything is!” exclaimed the girl; and indeed the room in which they now found themselves was singularly charming.