" said Mrs.
Verrier, when they were alone again.

Daphne made no reply. And Mrs. Verrier, after observing her for a
moment, resumed:

"I suppose it was the Bostonians?"

"I suppose so. What does it matter?" The tone was dry and sharp.

"Daphne, you goose!" laughed Mrs. Verrier, "I believe this is the very
first invitation of theirs he has accepted at all. He was written to
about them by an old friend--his Eton master, or somebody of that sort.
And as they turned up here on a visit, instead of his having to go and
look for them at Boston, of course he had to call upon them."

"I dare say. And of course he had to go to tea with them yesterday, and
he had to take them to Arlington this afternoon! I suppose I'd better
tell you--we had a quarrel on the subject last night."

"Daphne!--don't, for heaven's sake, make him think himself too
important!" cried Mrs. Verrier.

Daphne, with both elbows on the table, was slowly crunching a morsel of
toast in her small white teeth. She had a look of concentrated
energy--as of a person charged and overcharged with force of some kind,
impatient to be let loose. Her black eyes sparkled; impetuosity and will
shone from them; although they showed also rims of fatigue, as if Miss
Daphne's nights had not of late been all they should be. Mrs. Verrier
was chiefly struck, however, by the perception that for the first time
Daphne was not having altogether her own way with the world. Madeleine
had not observed anything of the same kind in her before. In general she
was in entire command both of herself and of the men who surrounded her.
She made a little court out of them, and treated them _en despote_. But
Roger Barnes had not lent himself to the process; he had not played the
game properly; and Daphne's sleep had been disturbed for the first time
in history.

It had been admitted very soon between the two friends--without putting
it very precisely--that Daphne was interested in Roger Barnes. Mrs.
Verrier believed that the girl had been originally carried off her feet
by the young man's superb good looks, and by the natural
distinction--evident in all societies--which they conferred upon him.
Then, no doubt, she had been piqued by his good-humoured, easy way--the
absence of any doubt of himself, of tremor, of insistence. Mrs. Verrier
said to herself--not altogether shrewdly--that he had no nerves, or no
heart; and Daphne had not yet come across the genus. Her lovers had
either possessed