As he put this temptation before her, he slowed down the car in front of a shop with big glass windows full of sparkling cakes, and ribbon-tied baskets of crystallized fruits.  Through the windows Rosemary could see a great many well-dressed people sitting at little marble tables, and it would have been delightful to go in.  But she shook her head.  The sun was setting over the sea.  The sky was flooded with pink and gold, while all the air was rosy with a wonderful glow which painted the mountains, even the dappled-grey plane trees, and the fronts of the gaily decorated shops.

The donkey women were leading their patient little animals away from the stand on the sea promenade, up to Sorbio for the night; and their dark faces under the queer, mushroom hats were ruddy and beautiful in the rose-light.

“As soon as the sun goes down, it gets dark here,” said Rosemary, regretfully.  “Thank you very much, but I’d rather go home now.  You see, I do so want you to be there already, waiting to surprise Angel when she comes in.”

“No time even to buy a doll?”

“I’d rather go home, thank you.  Besides, though I should like to have a new doll, perhaps darling Evie would be sad if I played with another.”

Hugh was obediently turning the car’s bonnet towards Monte Carlo, and for the fraction of a second he was foolish enough almost to lose control of it, on account of a start he gave.  “Evie!” he echoed.

It was years since he had spoken that name.

“She’s my doll,” explained Rosemary.

“Oh!” said Hugh.

“But I don’t think she’d mind or be sad if you gave me a doll’s house,” went on the child, “if you should have time to get it for me by and bye; that is, if you really want to give me something for Christmas, you know.”

“Of course I do.  But tell me, why did you name your doll Evie?”

He put the question in a low voice, as if he were half ashamed of asking it; and as at that instant a tram boomed by, Rosemary heard only the first words.

“I ’sposed you would,” she replied.  “Fathers do like to give their little girls Christmas presents, Jane says; maybe that’s why they’re obliged to come back always on Christmas Eve, if they’ve been lost.  Do you know, even if there aren’t any fairies, it’s just like a fairy story having my father come back, and take me to Angel in a motor car on Christmas eve.”

“Good gracious!” exclaimed Hugh Egerton.  “Did you say—­father?”

“Yes,” replied Rosemary.  “You’re almost like a fairy father, I said.”

So, he was her father—­her long lost father!  Poor little lamb, he began to guess at the story now.  There was a scamp of a father who had “not been very kind” to Angel, and had been lost, or had thoughtfully lost himself.  For some extraordinary reason the child imagined that he—­well, if it were not pathetic, it would be funny.  But somehow he did not feel much inclined to laugh.  Poor little thing!  His heart yearned over her; but the situation was becoming strained.  Unless he could think of some good way out of it, he might have a scene when he was obliged to rob the child of her father, on reaching the door of her house.