re," he said. "It's all right, and nothing
in the world to worry about. So good-night, old lady. I'll be polite
enough to him, never fear--if we happen to be thrown together. So
good-night!"

"But, George, dear--"

"I'm going to bed, old lady; so good-night."'

Thus the interview closed perforce. She kissed him again before going
slowly to her own room, her perplexity evidently not dispersed; but the
subject was not renewed between them the next day or subsequently. Nor
did Fanny make any allusion to the cryptic approbation she had bestowed
upon her nephew after the Major's "not very successful little dinner";
though she annoyed George by looking at him oftener and longer than
he cared to be looked at by an aunt. He could not glance her way, it
seemed, without finding her red-rimmed eyes fixed upon him eagerly, with
an alert and hopeful calculation in them which he declared would send a
nervous man, into fits. For thus, one day, he broke out, in protest:

"It would!" he repeated vehemently. "Given time it would--straight into
fits! What do you find the matter with me? Is my tie always slipping up
behind? Can't you look at something else? My Lord! We'd better buy a cat
for you to stare at, Aunt Fanny! A cat could stand it, maybe. What in
the name of goodness do you expect to see?"

But Fanny laughed good-naturedly, and was not offended. "It's more as
if I expected you to see something, isn't it?" she said quietly, still
laughing.

"Now, what do you mean by that?"

"Never mind!"

"All right, I don't. But for heaven's sake stare at somebody else
awhile. Try it on the house-maid!"

"Well, well," Fanny said indulgently, and then chose to be more obscure
in her meaning than ever, for she adopted a tone of deep sympathy for
her final remark, as she left him: "I don't wonder you're nervous these
days, poor boy!"

And George indignantly supposed that she referred to the ordeal of
Lucy's continued absence. During this period he successfully avoided
contact with Lucy's father, though Eugene came frequently to the
house, and spent several evenings with Isabel and Fanny; and sometimes
persuaded them and the Major to go for an afternoon's motoring. He did
not, however, come again to the Major's Sunday evening dinner, even when
George Amberson returned. Sunday evening was the time, he explained, for
going over the week's work with his factory managers.

When Lucy came home the autumn was far enough advanced to smell of