In Nina’s room were three flowers from Royal Blondin.  Nina said hastily, and in rapture:  “Water lilies!” but a ten-year-old memory told Harriet that they were lotus blooms.  Another girl had had lotus blooms years ago; Harriet wondered if Royal always sent them to the women he admired, or rather, to the one whose favour was, for the moment, to his advantage.

Nina had no such thoughts.  Radiantly and amazedly she turned to Harriet.

“Oh, Miss Harriet, look!  They’re from Mr. Blondin!  Oh, I do think that is terribly nice of him.  The idea!  The idea!  We were speaking of a poem called ‘The Lotus Flower’.  Did you ever?  I think that is terribly decent of him, don’t you?  Shan’t I write him?  Would you?  Hadn’t I better write him right now?  Will you help me?  I do think that is terribly decent of him, don’t you?”

And so on indefinitely.  Harriet felt rather sorry for the gauche little creature who flung aside her hat and wrap, and sat biting her gold pen-handle, and spoiling sheet after sheet of paper.  But there was protection in Nina’s absorption, too; she was far too happy to know or care that Harriet felt somewhat worried, or to make any comment when they went down to lunch to find that Isabelle begged to be excused.  They lunched alone with the old lady.

At about three, when the important note was written, and Harriet and Nina were idling on the shady terrace, with the hound, the new magazines, and their books, Hansen brought one of the small closed cars to the side door.  Five minutes later Isabelle, in a thin white coat, a veiled white hat, and with a gorgeous white-furred wrap over her arm, came out.  Germaine was with her, carrying two shiny black suitcases.  Isabelle, Harriet thought, looked superbly handsome, but Germaine had evidently been scolded, and had red eyes.

Isabelle came over to give her daughter a farewell kiss.

“Mrs. Webb has telephoned for me, ducky.  Your father isn’t coming home to-night, but have a happy time with Miss Harriet, and I’ll be back in a day or two.”

“I thought that you were dining to-morrow at the Jays’!” Harriet said.  That she had not been mistaken did not occur to her until she saw the colour flood Isabelle’s face.

“I forgot it.  But I wonder if you will be sweet enough to telephone to-morrow morning, and say that I am obliging an old friend?” Isabelle said, smoothly.  “I shall be with Mrs. Webb in Great Barrington, Harriet.  She made it a personal favour, and I couldn’t refuse!  Good-bye, both of you.  All right, Hansen!”

They swept away, leaving Harriet with a strange sense of nervousness and suspense.  The summer air seemed charged with menace, and the silence that followed the noise of the car oddly ominous.  She looked about nervously; Nina was drifting through Vanity Fair, the sun was warm, and the air sweet and still.  But still her heart was beating madly, and she felt frightened and ill at ease.