e and Harvard on the football field. Her eyes danced, her lips
were parted a little, her young bosom rose and fell.

"And so you see," said Palgrave, putting his hand on the back of her
chair, "I can stay as long as the Hosacks will have me, and one day
I'll drive you over to my bachelor cottage on the dune. It will
interest you."

"The only thing that has any interest at the moment is dancing," said
Oldershaw loudly. "By the way, you don't happen to be a member of the
club, do you, Mr. Palgrave?"

With consummate impudence Palgrave caught his eye and made a sort of
policeman gesture. "Run away, my lad," he said, "run away and amuse
yourself." He almost asked for death.

With a thick mutter that sounded like "My God," Oldershaw balanced
himself to hit, his face the color of a beet-root,--and instantly Joan
was on her feet between them with a hand on the boy's chest.

"No murder here," she said, "please!"

"Murder!" echoed Palgrave, scoffing.

"Yes, murder. Can't you see that this boy could take you and break you
like a dry twig? Let's go back, all three of us. We don't want to
become the center of a sight-seeing crowd." And she took an arm of each
shaking man and went across the drive to where the car was parked.

And so the danger moment was evaded,--young Oldershaw warm with pride,
Palgrave sullen and angry. They made a trio which had its prototypes
all the way back to the beginning of the world.

It did Palgrave no good to crouch ignominiously on the step of the car
which Oldershaw drove back hell for leather.

The bridge tables were still occupied. The white lane was still across
the sea. Frogs and crickets still continued their noisy rivalry, but it
was a different climate out there on the dunes from that of the village
with its cloying warmth.

Palgrave went into the house at once with a brief "Thank you." Joan
waited while Harry put the car into a garage. Bed made no appeal.
Bridge bored,--it required concentration. She would play the game of
sex with Gilbert if he were to be found. So the boy had to be disposed
of.

"Harry," she said, when he joined her, chuckling at having come top dog
out of the recent blaze, "you'd better go straight to bed now. We're
going to be up early in the morning, you know."

"Just what I was thinking," he answered. "By Jove, you've given me a
corking good evening. The best of my young life. You ... you certainly
are,--well, I don't know how to do you justice. I'd have