orable, obstinate little face to look at Jan, nodded her curly head
vigorously.

"I think not," Jan remarked rather unsteadily, "because if you do,
people won't like you. We can none of us go about smacking innocent
folks just for the fun of it. Everybody would be shocked and horrified."

"Socked and hollified," echoed little Fay, delighted with the new words,
"socked and hollified!... What nelse?"

"What usually follows is that the disagreeable little girl gets smacked
herself."

"No," said Fay, but a thought doubtfully. "No," more firmly. Then with a
smile that was subtly compounded of pathos and confidence, "Nobody would
mack plitty little Fay ... 'cept ... plapse ... Auntie Dzan."

The stern aunt in question snatched up her niece to cover her with
kisses. Ayah escaped chastisement that evening, for, arrayed in a white
nighty, "plitty little Fay" sat good as gold on Jan's knee, absorbed in
the interest of "This little pig went to market," told on her own toes.
Even Tony, the aloof and unfriendly, consented to unbend to the extent
of being interested in the dialogue of "John Smith and Minnie Bowl, can
you shoe a little foal?" and actually thrust out his own bare feet that
Jan might make them take part in the drama of the "twa wee doggies who
went to the market," and came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper."

At the end of every song or legend came the inevitable "What nelse?"
from little Fay--and Jan only escaped after the most solemn promises had
been exacted for a triple bill on the morrow.

When she had changed and went back to the sitting-room, dinner was
ready. Lalkhan again bent over her with fatherly solicitude as he
offered each course, and this time Jan, being really hungry, rather
enjoyed his ministrations. A boy assisted at the sideboard, and another
minion appeared to bring the dishes from the kitchen, for the butler and
the boy never left the room for an instant.

Fay looked like a tired ghost, and Jan could see that it was a great
effort to her to talk cheerfully and seem interested in the home news.

After dinner they went back to the sitting-room. Lalkhan brought coffee
and Fay lit a cigarette. Jan wandered round, looking at the photographs
and engravings on the walls.

"How is it," she asked, "that Mr. Ledgard seems to come in so many of
these groups? Did you rent the flat from a friend of his?"

"I didn't 'rent' the flat from anybody," Fay answered. "It's Peter's own
flat. He lent it to