“Perhaps it was only idle gossip,” she said.  “Is Miss Forbes a nice girl to talk to?  She struck me as being very animated.”

“Animated”—­ while in the company of that undoubted oaf, de Winton!  Theydon choked back something tinged with gall as he replied quietly: 

“She could not well help being highly intelligent.  Her father and mother are charming people.  I was introduced to Mr. Forbes owing to a magazine commission to write an article about his interest in aviation.  Now you see how promptly even the most gorgeous bubble bursts when it impinges against a solid little fact.  As it happens, Mr. Forbes and I will have so much in common during the next day or two that I am now going to stay with him.  I came here to pack a portmanteau.  If you’ll be a good little girl and listen while I’m at the telephone you will hear all about it.”

The words were no sooner uttered than he wanted to recall them.  It would be no easy matter to discuss Furneaux’s suggestion with any one in Fortescue Square without letting his sister into the secret that the visit was necessitated by considerations of his own personal safety.

Mrs. Paxton’s eyes were sparkling with a new interest.

“I had no idea you were on terms of such intimacy with the family,” she cried.  “Don’t tell me, Frank, that your flights have taken you to the elevated region in which millionaires’ daughters figure as possible brides!”

“Now you are making me out a Mormon,” and Theydon grinned fiercely.

“You know what I mean.  This Miss Forbes—­ by the way, what is her Christian name?”

“Let me see.  I think I have heard it.  Doris, is it, or Phyllis?  No, I remember now—­ Evelyn.”

“O, then, if you are so vague on that point I suppose I must reconcile myself to owning a bachelor brother again.”

He shook his head at her.

“Ah, you women!” he said.  “Yet I used to regard you as quite a sensible person, Mollie!  Now, how in the name of goodness could I possibly entertain any notion of marrying the only daughter of a man in Forbes’s position?”

“It all depends,” was the illogical but crushing retort.  “There are plenty of millionaires’ daughters whom I would not regard as good enough for my brother.  And, let me tell you, the family is making progress.  A little bird whispered the other day that George’s name will appear in the next list of honors.  He is to receive a knighthood.”

It was not new to Theydon to learn that his brother-in-law stood in high favor with the Government, because Paxton had been appointed on two Royal Commissions with reference to mining regulations, but he affected a surprised incredulity as offering a way of escape from an inquisition which he dreaded.

“Dear me!” he smirked.

Therein he erred.  His sister gave him a puzzled glance.

“You are not yourself today, Frank,” she said dubiously.  “You are acting.  For whose benefit?  Not mine, surely!”