“It’s dreadful!” she said humbly—­“I’m afraid I know just nothing about it.”

He looked at her with a friendly wonder, and she, flushing deeper, was glad to see him claimed by a lively girl on his left, while she fell back on Mr. Parish, the agent, who, however, seemed to be absorbed in the amazing—­and agreeable—­fact that Lord Buntingford, though he drank no wine himself, had yet some Moet-et-Charidon of 1904 left to give to his guests.  Mr. Parish, as he sipped it, realized that the war was indeed over.

But, all the time, he gave a certain amount of scrutiny to the little lady beside him.  So she was to be “companion” to Miss Helena Pitstone—­to prevent her getting into scrapes—­if she could.  Lord Buntingford had told him that his cousin, Lady Mary Chance, had chosen her.  Lady Mary had reported that “companions” were almost as difficult to find as kitchenmaids, and that she had done her best for him in finding a person of gentle manners and quiet antecedents.  “Such people will soon be as rare as snakes in Ireland”—­had been the concluding sentence in Lady Mary’s letter, according to Lord Buntingford’s laughing account of it.  Ah, well, Lady Mary was old-fashioned.  He hoped the young widow might be useful; but he had his doubts.  She looked a weak vessel to be matching herself with anything so handsome and so pronounced as the young lady opposite.

Why, the young lady was already quarrelling with her guardian!  For the whole table had suddenly become aware of a gust in the neighbourhood of Lord Buntingford—­a gust of heated talk—­although the only heated person seemed to be Miss Pitstone.  Lord Buntingford was saying very little; but whatever he did say was having a remarkable effect on his neighbour.  Then, before the table knew what it was all about, it was over.  Lord Buntingford had turned resolutely away, and was devoting himself to conversation with Lady Cynthia, while his ward was waging a fresh war of repartee with the distinguished soldier beside her, in which her sharpened tones and quick breathing suggested the swell after a storm.

Mrs. Friend too had noticed.  She had been struck with the sudden tightening of the guardian’s lip, the sudden stiffening of his hand lying on the table.  She wondered anxiously what was the matter.

In the library afterwards, Lady Cynthia, Mrs. Friend, and the two girls—­his daughter and his guest—­who had come with Mr. Parish, settled into a little circle near the wood-fire which the chilliness of the May evening made pleasant.

Helena Pitstone meanwhile walked away by herself to a distant part of the room and turned over photographs, with what seemed to Mrs. Friend a stormy hand.  And as she did so, everyone in the room was aware of her, of the brilliance and power of the girl’s beauty, and of the energy that like an aura seemed to envelop her personality.  Lady Cynthia made several attempts to capture her, but in vain.  Helena would only answer in monosyllables, and if approached, retreated further into the dim room, ostensibly in search of a book on a distant shelf, really in flight.  Lady Cynthia, with a shrug, gave it up.