her's death, had refused him. But you
see he might have been my stepfather."

Mrs. Brookenham took it in, but she had suddenly a brighter light. "He
might have been my OWN father! Besides," she went on, "if his line is to
love the mothers why on earth doesn't he love ME? I'm in all conscience
enough of one."

"Ah but isn't there in your case the fact of a daughter?" Vanderbank
asked with a slight embarrassment.

Mrs. Brookenham stared. "What good does that do me?"

"Why, didn't she tell you?"

"Nanda? She told me he doesn't like her any better than he likes me."

Vanderbank in his turn showed surprise. "That's really what she said?"

"She had on her return from your rooms a most unusual fit of frankness,
for she generally tells me nothing."

"Well," said Vanderbank, "how did she put it?"

Mrs. Brook reflected--recovered it. "'I like him awfully, but I am not
in the least HIS idea.'"

"His idea of what?"

"That's just what I asked her. Of the proper grandchild for mamma."

Vanderbank hesitated. "Well, she isn't." Then after another pause: "But
she'll do."

His companion gave him a deep look. "You'll make her?"

He got up, and on seeing him move Mr. Longdon also rose, so that, facing
each other across the room, they exchanged a friendly signal or two.
"I'll make her."

III

Their hostess's account of Mr. Cashmore's motive for his staying on was
so far justified as that Vanderbank, while Mr. Longdon came over to Mrs.
Brook, appeared without difficulty further to engage him. The lady in
question meanwhile had drawn her old friend down, and her present method
of approach would have interested an observer aware of the unhappy
conviction she had just privately expressed. Some trace indeed of the
glimpse of it enjoyed by Mr. Cashmere's present interlocutor might have
been detected in the restlessness that Vanderbank's desire to keep the
other pair uninterrupted was still not able to banish from his attitude.
Not, however, that Mrs. Brook took the smallest account of it as she
quickly broke out: "How can we thank you enough, my dear man, for your
extraordinary kindness?" The reference was vivid, yet Mr. Longdon looked
so blank about it that she had immediately to explain. "I mean to dear
Van, who has told us of your giving him the great happiness--unless he's
too dreadfully mistaken--of letting him really know you. He's such a
tremendous friend of ours that nothing so delightful can befall him
without it