Joan surveyed him consideringly.

“I’ve never observed that you have a saint’s face, Jerry,” she remarked calmly.

“Beast!  Joan”—­he made a dive for her hand, but she eluded him with the skill of frequent practice—­“how much longer are you going to keep me on tenterhooks?  You know I’m the prodigal son, and that I’m only waiting for you to say ‘yes,’ to return to the family bosom—­”

“And you propose to use me as a stepping stone!  I know.  You think that if you return as an engaged young man—­”

“With a good reference from my last situation,” interpolated Jerry, grinning.

“Yes—­that too, then your father will forget all your peccadilloes and say, ’Bless you, my children’—­”

“Limelight on the blushing bur-ride!  And they lived happily ever after!  Yes, that’s it!  Jolly good programme, isn’t it?”

And somehow Jerry’s big boyish arm slipped itself round Joan’s shoulders—­and Joan raised no objections.

“But—­about Max and Diana?” resumed Miss Stair after a judicious interval.

“Well, what about them?”

“Can’t we—­can’t we do anything?  Talk to them?”

“I just see myself talking to Errington!” murmured Jerry.  “I’d about as soon discuss its private and internal arrangements with a volcano!  My dear kid, it all depends upon Diana and whether she’s content to trust her husband or not. I’d trust Max through thick and thin, and no questions asked.  If he blew up the Houses of Parliament, I should believe he’d some good reason for doing it. . . .  But then, I’m not his wife!”

“Well, I shall talk to Diana,” said Joan seriously.  “I’m sure Dad would, if he were here.  And I do think, Jerry, you might screw up courage to speak to Max.  He can’t eat you!  And—­and I simply hate to see those two at cross purposes!  They were so happy at the beginning.”

The mention of matrimonial happiness started a new train of thought, and the conversation became of a more personal nature—­the kind of conversation wherein every second or third sentence starts with “when we are married,” and thence launches out into rose-red visions of the great adventure.

Presently the house door clanged, and a minute later Diana came into the room.  She threw aside her furs and looked round hastily.

“Where’s Max?” she asked sharply.

“Not concealed beneath the Chesterfield,” volunteered Jerry flippantly.  Then, as he caught a hostile sparkle of irritation in her grey eyes, he added hastily, “He’s in his study.”

Diana nodded, and, without further remark, went away in search of her husband.

“Are you busy, Max?” she asked, pausing on the threshold of the room where he was working.

He rose at once, placing a chair for her with the chilly courtesy which he had accorded her since their last interview in this same room.

“Not too busy to attend to you,” he replied.  “Where will you sit?  By the fire?”