Oh, the horrible stillness!  Why did he not speak?  He placed his hand lightly on my head.

“It doesn’t matter, Syb.  I know you didn’t mean to hurt me.  I suppose you thought you couldn’t affect my dark, old, saddle-flap-looking phiz.  That is one of the disadvantages of being a big lumbering concern like I am.  Jump up.  That’s the girl.”

I arose.  I was giddy, and would have fallen but for Harold steadying me by the shoulder.  I looked up at him nervously and tried to ask his forgiveness, but I failed.

“Good heavens, child, you are as white as a sheet!  I was a beast to speak harshly to you.”  He held a glass of water to my lips and I drank.

“Great Jupiter, there’s nothing to worry about!  I know you hadn’t the slightest intention of hurting me.  It’s nothing—­I’ll be right in a few moments.  I’ve often been amused at and have admired your touch-me-not style.  You only forgot you had something in your hand.”

He had taken it quite as a matter of fact, and was excusing me in the kindest possible terms.

“Good gracious, you mustn’t stew over such a trifling accident!  It’s nothing.  Just tie this handkerchief on for me, please, and then we’ll go back to the others or there will be a search-party after us.”

He could have tied the handkerchief just as well himself—­it was only out of kindly tact he requested my services.  I accepted his kindness gratefully.  He sank on his knee so that I could reach him, and I tied a large white handkerchief across the injured part.  He could not open his eye, and hot water poured from it, but he made light of the idea of it paining.  I was feeling better now, so we returned to the ballroom.  The clock struck the half-hour after eleven as we left the room.  Harold entered by one door and, I by another, and I slipped into a seat as though I had been there some time.

There were only a few people in the room.  The majority were absent—­some love-making, others playing cards.  Miss Beecham. was one who was not thus engaged.  She exclaimed at once: 

“Good gracious, boy, what have you done to yourself?”

“Looks as if he had been interviewing a belligerent tramp,” said aunt Helen, smilingly.

“He’s run into the clothes-line, that’s what he’s done,” said Miss Augusta confidently, after she had peeped beneath the bandage.

“You ought to get a bun for guessing, aunt Gus,” said Harold laughing.

I told them to put the clothes-lines up when they had done with them.  I knew there would be an accident.”

“Perhaps they were put up high enough for ordinary purposes,” remarked her nephew.

“Let me do something for you, dear.”

“No, thank you, aunt Gus.  It is nothing,” he said carelessly, and the matter dropped.

Harold Beecham. was not a man to invite inquiry concerning himself.