Bessie entered to clear the table.

‘Hum!  Well!  I’ll think it over again.’  He breathed out smoke, and departed.  Rose set her lips hard.  She was seen no more that evening.

In the drawing-room, Stanway found Twemlow and Millicent talking in low voices on the hearthrug.  Ethel lounged on the sofa.  Leonora was not present, but she came in immediately.

‘Let’s have a game at solo,’ John suggested.  And because five was a convenient number they all played.  Twemlow and Milly were the best performers; Milly’s gift for card-playing was notorious in the family.

‘Do you ever play poker?’ Twemlow asked, when the other three had been beggared of counters.

‘No,’ said John, cautiously.  ‘Not here.’

‘It’s lots of fun,’ Twemlow went on, looking at the girls.

‘Oh, Mr. Twemlow,’ Milly cried.  ’It’s awfully gambly, isn’t it?  Do teach us.’

In a quarter of an hour Milly was bluffing her father with success.  She said that in future she should never want to play at any other game.  As for Leonora, though she lost and gained counters with happy equanimity, she did not like the game; it frightened her.  When Milly had shown a straight flush and scooped the kitty she sent the child out of the room with a message to the kitchen concerning coffee and sandwiches.

‘Won’t Milly sing?’ Twemlow asked.

‘Certainly, if you wish,’ Leonora responded.

‘Ay!  Let’s have something,’ said Stanway, lazily.

And when Millicent returned, she was told that she must sing before eating.  She sang ‘Love is a Plaintive Song,’ to Ethel’s inert accompaniment, and she gave it exactly as though she had been on the stage, with all the dramatic action, all the freedom, all the allurements, which she had lavished on the audience in the Town Hall.

‘Very good,’ said her father.  ’I like that.  It’s very pretty.  I didn’t hear it the other night.’  Twemlow merely thanked the artist.  Leonora was silently uncomfortable.

After coffee both the girls disappeared.  Twemlow looked round, and then spoke to Stanway.

‘I’ve been very much impressed by your daughter’s talent,’ he said.  His tone was extremely serious.  It implied that, now the children were gone, the adults could talk with freedom.

Stanway was a little startled, and more than a little flattered.

‘Really?’ he questioned.

‘Really,’ said Twemlow, emphasising still further his seriousness.  ’Has she ever been taught?’

‘Only by a local teacher up here at Hillport,’ Leonora told him.

‘She ought to have lessons from a first-class master.’

‘Why?’ asked Stanway abruptly.

‘Well,’ Twemlow said, ‘you never know——­’

‘You honestly think her voice is worth cultivating?’ John demanded, impelled to participate in Twemlow’s gravity.

‘I do.  And not only her voice——­’

‘Ah,’ Stanway mused, ‘there’s no first-class masters in this district.’