He made another discovery within a few minutes.  Stubby maneuvered himself close to Etta Robbin-Steele.  Stubby was not quite so adept at repression as most of his class.  He was a little more naive, more prone to act upon his natural, instinctive impulses.  MacRae was aware of that.  He saw now a swift by-play that escaped the rest.  Nothing of any consequence,—­a look, the motion of a hand, a fleeting something on the girl’s face and Stubby’s.  Jack glanced at Nelly Abbott sitting beside him, her small blonde head pertly inclined.  Nelly saw it too.  She smiled knowingly.

“Has the brunette siren hooked Stubby?” MacRae inquired in a discreet undertone.

“I think so.  I’m not sure.  Etta’s such an outrageous flirt,” Nelly said.  “I hope not, anyway.  I’m afraid I can’t quite appreciate Etta as a prospective sister-in-law.”

“No?”

“She’s catty—­and vain as a peacock.  Stubby ought to marry a nice sensible girl who’d mother him,” Nelly observed with astonishing conviction; “like Betty, for instance.”

“Oh, you seem to have very definite ideas on that subject,” MacRae smiled.  He did not commit himself further.  But he resented the suggestion.  There was also an amusing phase of Nelly’s declaration which did not escape him,—­the pot calling the kettle black.  Etta Robbin-Steele did flirt.  She had dancing black eyes that flung a challenge to men.  But Nelly herself was no shrinking violet, for all her baby face.  She was like an elf.  Her violet eyes were capable of infinite shades of expression.  She, herself, had a way of appropriating men who pleased her, to the resentful dismay of other young women.  It pleased her to do that with Jack MacRae whenever he was available.  And until Betty had preempted a place in his heart without even trying, Jack MacRae had been quite willing to let his fancy linger romantically on Nelly Abbott.

As it was,—­he looked across the room at Betty chatting with young Lane.  What a damned fool he was,—­he, MacRae!  All his wires were crossed.  If some inescapable human need urged him to love, how much better to love this piquant bit of femininity beside him?  But he couldn’t do it.  It wasn’t possible.  All the old rebellion stirred in him.  The locked chambers of his mind loosed pictures of Squitty, memories of things which had happened there, as he let his eyes drift from Betty, whom he loved, to her mother, whom his father had loved and lost.  She had made his father suffer through love.  Her daughter was making Donald MacRae’s son suffer likewise.  Again, through some fantastic quirk of his imagination, the stodgy figure of Horace Gower loomed in the background, shadowy and sinister.  There were moments, like the present, when he felt hatred of the man concretely, as he could feel thirst or hunger.

“A penny for your thoughts,” Nelly bantered.

“They’d be dear at half the price,” MacRae said, forcing a smile.

He was glad when those people went their way.  Nelly put on a coat and went with them.  Stubby drew Jack up to his den.