or less provincial?  Or was it simply that one hated Germans?...  Why didn’t Fleur come, so that he could get away?  He saw those three return together from the other room and pass back along the far side of the screen.  The boy was standing before the Juno now.  And, suddenly, on the other side of her, Soames saw—­his daughter, with eyebrows raised, as well they might be.  He could see her eyes glint sideways at the boy, and the boy look back at her.  Then Irene slipped her hand through his arm, and drew him on.  Soames saw him glancing round, and Fleur looking after them as the three went out.

A voice said cheerfully:  “Bit thick, isn’t it, sir?”

The young man who had handed him his handkerchief was again passing.  Soames nodded.

“I don’t know what we’re coming to.”

“Oh!  That’s all right, sir,” answered the young man cheerfully; “they don’t either.”

Fleur’s voice said:  “Hallo, Father!  Here you are!” precisely as if he had been keeping her waiting.

The young man, snatching off his hat, passed on.

“Well,” said Soames, looking her up and down, “you’re a punctual sort of young woman!”

This treasured possession of his life was of medium height and colour, with short, dark chestnut hair; her wide-apart brown eyes were set in whites so clear that they glinted when they moved, and yet in repose were almost dreamy under very white, black-lashed lids, held over them in a sort of suspense.  She had a charming profile, and nothing of her father in her face save a decided chin.  Aware that his expression was softening as he looked at her, Soames frowned to preserve the unemotionalism proper to a Forsyte.  He knew she was only too inclined to take advantage of his weakness.

Slipping her hand under his arm, she said: 

“Who was that?”

“He picked up my handkerchief.  We talked about the pictures.”

“You’re not going to buy that, Father?”

“No,” said Soames grimly; “nor that Juno you’ve been looking at.”

Fleur dragged at his arm.  “Oh!  Let’s go!  It’s a ghastly show.”

In the doorway they passed the young man called Mont and his partner.  But Soames had hung out a board marked “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” and he barely acknowledged the young fellow’s salute.

“Well,” he said in the street, “whom did you meet at Imogen’s?”

“Aunt Winifred, and that Monsieur Profond.”

“Oh!” muttered Soames; “that chap!  What does your aunt see in him?”

“I don’t know.  He looks pretty deep—­mother says she likes him.”

Soames grunted.

“Cousin Val and his wife were there, too.”

“What!” said Soames.  “I thought they were back in South Africa.”

“Oh, no!  They’ve sold their farm.  Cousin Val is going to train race-horses on the Sussex Downs.  They’ve got a jolly old manor-house; they asked me down there.”