“Well, then—­to keep you quiet—­sans prejudice!”

She demurely offered her cheek.  But his lips were scarcely allowed to touch it, she drew away so quickly.

“Now, then, that’s quite settled!” she said in her most matter-of-fact voice.  “Such a comfort!  Let’s go back.”

They turned back along the avenue, a rather flushed pair, enjoying each other’s society, and discussing the dance, and their respective partners.

It happened, however, that this little scene—­at its most critical point—­had only just escaped a spectator.  Philip Buntingford passed across the further end of the avenue on his way to the Horne Farm, at the moment when Helena and Geoffrey turned their backs to him, walking towards the house.  They were not aware of him; but he stopped a moment to watch the young figures disappearing under the green shade.  A look of pleasure was in his blue eyes.  It seemed to him that things were going well in that direction.  And he wished them to go well.  He had known Geoffrey since he was a little chap in his first breeches; had watched him through Winchester and Oxford, had taken as semi-paternal pride in the young man’s distinguished war record, and had helped him with his election expenses.  He himself was intimate with very few of the younger generation.  His companions in the Admiralty work, and certain senior naval officers with whom that work had made him acquainted:—­a certain intimacy, a certain real friendship had indeed grown up between him and some of them.  But something old and tired in him made the effort of bridging the gulf between himself and men in their twenties—­generally speaking—­too difficult.  Or he thought so.  The truth was, perhaps, as Geoffrey had expressed it to Helena, that many of the younger men who had been brought into close official or business contact with him felt a real affection for him.  Buntingford would have thought it strange that they should do so, and never for one moment assumed it.

After its languid morning, Beechmark revived with the afternoon.  Its young men guests, whom the Dansworth rioters would probably have classed as parasites and idlers battening on the toil of the people, had in fact earned their holiday by a good many months of hard work, whether in the winding up of the war, or the re-starting of suspended businesses, or the renewed activities of the bar; and they were taking it whole-heartedly.  Golf, tennis, swimming, and sleep had filled the day, and it was a crowd in high spirits that gathered round Mrs. Friend for tea on the lawn, somewhere about five o’clock.  Lucy, who had reached that stage of fatigue the night before when—­like Peter Dale, only for different reasons—­her bed became her worst enemy, had scarcely slept a wink, but was nevertheless presiding gaily over the tea-table.  She looked particularly small and slight in a little dress of thin grey stuff that Helena had coaxed her to wear in lieu of her perennial black, but there was that expression in