“You’ve forgotten the impression made by Una herself; what reason have you for believing that you won’t forget the ideals also?”

“There’s no danger of that.  She merely opened my eyes.  Anyone else could have done the same thing.”

“Ah!  Has Miss Van Wyck done so?”

“Yes.  She’s very charitable.  But she doesn’t make a business of it like Una.  She has so many interests and then—­” He paused.  I waited.

“Roger,” he went on in a moment, “I thought Una wonderful.  I still do.  But Marcia’s different.  Una was a chance visitor.  Marcia is a friend—­an old friend.  She’s like no other woman in the world.  You will understand her better some day.”

“Perhaps,” I said thoughtfully.  After that Jerry would say no more.  Perhaps he thought he had already said too much, for presently he took himself off to bed.  At the foot of the stairs he paused.

“By the way, Roger, we’ll be five instead of four for dinner tomorrow.”

“Who now?”

“A friend of Marcia’s, Channing Lloyd, a chap from town.  He came up today.”

That admission cost Jerry something, and it explained many things, for I had heard of Channing Lloyd.

“Ah, very well,” I said carelessly and shook out my paper.

“Good-night, Roger.”

“Good-night, Jerry.”

The boy was changed.  It may not seem a serious thing to you, my precocious reader, who number your flirtations among the trivial affairs of life.  Calf love, you will say, is not a matter worth bothering one’s brains about.  You will class that ailment perhaps with the whooping cough and the measles and sneer it out of existence.  But I would remind you that Jerry’s mind and character were quite mature.  I had schooled them myself and I know.  If Jerry had fallen in love with Marcia Van Wyck who proposed to play at her game of “pitch-farthing” with so fine a soul as Jerry’s, the thing was serious, serious for both of them.  His attitude toward the girl in his conversation tonight reminded me that affairs had already progressed a long way.  She had come to Briar Hills, flattering Jerry, of course, that they could be alone, intriguing meanwhile with Channing Lloyd, a wild fellow, according to Jack Ballard, who at thirty could have unprofitably shared his omniscience with the devil.  A fine foil for Jerry!

At dinner, the following night, we made a curious party.  Marcia Van Wyck, radiant in pale green, with her admirers one at either hand; Channing Lloyd, dark, massive, well-groomed, with a narrow smile and an air of complete domination of the table; Jerry at the other side, rolling bread-pills and forcing humor rather awkwardly; Miss Gore, solemn in black satin—­all of them elegant and correct in evening clothes, while I in my rather shabby serge sat awkwardly trying to hide the shininess of my elbows.  From my position at one end of the table I had an excellent opportunity to study the company.  I saw in Lloyd, I think,