though you really mattered. It takes
a man of tough fibre to resist these qualities. Women, on the other
hand, especially of the Lady Underhill type, can resist them without
an effort.

"Go and stir him up," said Jill, alluding to the absent Mr. Rooke.
"Tell him to come and talk to me. Where's the nearest fire? I want to
get right over it and huddle."

"The fire's burning nicely in the sitting-room, miss."

Jill hurried into the sitting-room, and increased her hold on Barker's
esteem by exclaiming rapturously at the sight that greeted her. Barker
had expended time and trouble over the sitting-room. There was no
dust, no untidiness. The pictures all hung straight; the cushions were
smooth and unrumpled; and a fire of exactly the right dimensions
burned cheerfully in the grate, flickering cosily on the small piano
by the couch, on the deep leather arm-chairs which Freddie had brought
with him from Oxford, that home of comfortable chairs, and on the
photographs that studded the walls. In the centre of the mantelpiece,
the place of honour, was the photograph of herself which she had given
Derek a week ago.

"You're simply wonderful, Barker! I don't see how you manage to make a
room so cosy!" Jill sat down on the club fender that guarded the
fireplace, and held her hands over the blaze. "I can't understand why
men ever marry. Fancy having to give up all this!"

"I am gratified that you appreciate it, miss. I did my best to make it
comfortable for you. I fancy I hear Mr. Rooke coming now."

"I hope the others won't be long. I'm starving. Has Mrs. Barker got
something very good for dinner?"

"She has strained every nerve, miss."

"Then I'm sure it's worth waiting for. Hullo, Freddie."

Freddie Rooke, resplendent in evening dress, bustled in, patting his
tie with solicitous fingers. It had been right when he had looked in
the glass in his bedroom, but you never know about ties. Sometimes
they stay right, sometimes they wriggle up sideways. Life is full of
these anxieties.

"I shouldn't touch it," said Jill. "It looks beautiful, and, if I may
say so in confidence, is having a most disturbing effect on my
emotional nature. I'm not at all sure I shall be able to resist it
right through the evening. It isn't fair of you to try to alienate the
affections of an engaged young person like this."

Freddie squinted down, and became calmer.

"Hullo, Jill, old thing. Nobody here yet?"

"Well, I'm here--the _petite_ figure