She passed on, too considerate to press for details.  “Take off your hat and coat, won’t you?  When we have had some tea I will take you to your room.”

She was pleased to see that Charlie’s protege was garbed with extreme simplicity.  Her fair hair, which had been closely shorn, was beginning to curl at the ends.  She liked the delicate contrasting line of the black brows above the deep blue of the eyes.  She noticed that the veins on the white temples showed with great distinctness.

“Sit down!” she said.  “And now you must tell me what to call you.  Your name is Antoinette, isn’t it?”

“I’m generally called Toby,” said the visitor in a very shy voice.  “But you will call me—­what you like.”

“Would you like me to call you Toby?” Maud asked.

“Yes, please,” said Toby with unexpected briskness.

Maud smiled.  “Very well, my dear.  Then that is settled.  We are not going to be strangers, you and I. I expect you know that Lord Saltash and I are great friends—­though I have never met your father.”

Toby’s pale young face flushed suddenly.  She was silent for a moment.  Then:  “Lord Saltash has been very good to me,” she said in her shy voice.  “He—­saved me from drowning.  Wasn’t it—­wasn’t it nice of him to—­take the trouble?”

“Quite nice of him,” Maud agreed.  “You must have been very frightened, weren’t you?”

Toby suppressed a shudder.  “I was rather.  And the water was dreadfully cold.  I thought we should never come up again.  It was like—­it was like—­” She stopped herself.  “He said I was never to talk about it—­or think about it—­so I won’t, if you don’t mind.”

“Tell me about your father!” said Maud sympathetically.

For the second time the blue eyes flashed towards her.  “Oh, he is still ill in a nursing home and not allowed to see anyone.”  There was a hint of recklessness in her voice.  “They say he’ll get well again, but—­I don’t know.”

“You are anxious about him,” Maud said.

“No, I’m not.”  Recklessness became something akin to defiance.  “I don’t like him much.  He’s so surly.”

“My dear!” said Maud, momentarily disconcerted.

“Well, it’s no good pretending I do when I don’t, is it?” said Toby, and suddenly smiled at her with winning gracelessness.  “It isn’t my fault We’re not friends—­never have been.  Why,” she made a little gesture of the hands, “we hardly know each other.  I’d never been on The Night Moth before.”

“And you’ll never go again,” commented Bunny, entering at the moment, “Maud, do you know I took—­Miss Larpent—­” he turned deliberately to Toby who snapped her fingers in airy acknowledgment—­“to see the races instead of coming straight back—­according to the boss’s instructions.”

“Oh!  So that’s where you’ve been!” said Maud.

“Exactly so.”  Bunny pulled up a chair and disposed his long legs astride it.  “We saw several events, and made a bit.  Then Forest Fire let us down badly and we lost the lot.  After that we went into the paddock to cool ourselves and met the boss, who at once—­somewhat rudely—­ordered us home.  I have an impression he’s feeling waxy with me for some reason,” Bunny ended, stroking his chin reflectively.  “Daresay I shall get over it, however.”