h, he smiled.

"Then that's fixed up," he said. "I'll have an automobile for next
Saturday, and you shall arrange where we're to go."

"But you mustn't joy-ride," said Dorothy, suddenly remembering D.O.R.A.
and all her Don't's.

"Mustn't what?" demanded John Dene, in the tone of a man who finds his
pleasures suddenly threatened from an unexpected angle.

"It's forbidden to use petrol for pleasure," she explained.

John Dene made a noise in his throat that, from her knowledge of him,
Dorothy recognised as a sign that someone was on the eve of being
gingered-up.

"I'll get that automobile," he announced; and Dorothy knew that there
was trouble impending for Mr. Blair.

"And we'll have a picnic-hamper, shall we?" she cried excitedly.

"Sure," replied John Dene, "I'll order one."

"Oh, won't that be lovely, mother!" she cried, clapping her hands.

Mrs. West smiled her pleasure.

"Where are you taking us to dinner?" enquired Dorothy of John Dene.

"The Ritzton," he replied.

"Oh, but we're not dressed for that!"

"It's war time and I never dress," he announced, as if that settled the
matter.

"But--" began Mrs. West hesitatingly.

"Perhaps you'd rather not come?" he began tentatively, his
disappointment too obvious to disguise.

"Oh, but we want to come!" said Mrs. West, "only we're not in quite the
right clothes for the Ritzton, are we?"

"Don't you worry," he reassured her; then a moment later added, "that's
what I'm up against in this country. Everybody's putting on the
clothes they think other people expect them to wear. If people don't
like my clothes, they can look where I'm not sitting. We're not going
to win this war by wearing clothes," he announced.

Then Dorothy started to gurgle. The picture of endeavouring to win the
war without clothes struck her as comical.

"Dorothy!" admonished Mrs. West.

"I--I was just thinking, mother."

"Thinking of what?" asked John Dene.

"I was just wondering how Sir Lyster would look trying to win the war
without clothes," and she trailed off into a splutter of laughter.

"Dorothy!" Mrs. West turned to John Dene with a comical look of
concern. "I'm afraid my daughter is in one of her wilful moods to-day,
Mr. Dene," she explained.

"She'll do as she is," he announced with decision

And again Dorothy felt her cheeks burn.

"I like Mr. Dene," announced Mrs. West that night as she and Dorothy
sat at the open window of the drawing-room before go