it?"

Penelope glanced at her sharply.

"It's highly improbable," she said. "But a little philosophy would be
quite as useful--and a far more likely acquisition."

As she finished speaking a bell pealed through the flat--pealed with an
irritable suggestion that it had been rung unavailingly before. Followed
the abigail's footstep as she pursued her unhurried way to answer its
imperative demand, and presently a visitor was shown into the room. He
was a man of over seventy, erect and well-preserved, with white hair and
clipped moustache. There was an indefinable courtliness of manner about
him which recalled the days of lace ruffles and knee-breeches. The two
girls rose to greet him with unfeigned delight.

"Uncle!" cried Nan. "How dear of you to come just when our spirits were
at their lowest ebb!"

"My dears!" He kissed his niece and shook hands with Penelope. Nan
pushed an armchair towards the fire and tendered her cigarette case.

"You needn't be afraid of them, Uncle David," she informed him
reassuringly. "They're not gaspers."

"Sybarite! With the same confidence as if they were my own." And Lord
St. John helped himself smilingly.

"And why," he continued, "has the barometer fallen?"

Nan laughed.

"You can't expect it to be always 'set fair'!"

"I'd like it to be," returned St. John simply.

A fugitive thought flashed through Nan's mind that he and Peter Mallory
were merely young and old representatives of a similar type of man. She
could imagine Mallory growing into the same gracious old manhood as her
uncle.

"A propos," pursued Lord St. John, with a twinkle, "your handmaiden
appears to me a quite just cause and impediment."

"Oh, our 'Adagio'?" exclaimed Nan. "We've long since ceased to expect
much from her. Did she keep you waiting on the doorstep long?"

"Only about ten minutes," murmured St. John mildly. "But seriously, why
don't you--er--give her warning?"

"My dear innocent uncle!" protested Nan amusedly. "Don't you know that
that sort of thing isn't done nowadays--not in the best circles?"

"Besides," added Penelope practically, "we should probably be only out of
the frying pan into the fire. The jewels in the domestic line are few
and far between and certainly not to be purchased within our financial
limits. And frankly, there are very few jewels left at any price. Most
of the nice ones got married during the war--the servants you loved and
regarded as part of the