of gray green, and blackened brows and lashes
which, I suppose, had started life in red. She gave an effect of
prettiness and of thinking herself prettier than she was, an opinion in
which her dress-maker had backed her up.

Tony Dalziel was jolly, and said so many quaint things in priceless
slang that he kept me laughing; but I had eyes if not ears only for Di
and Major Vandyke. "Say, he's rushing your sister, isn't he? Making a
direct frontal attack--what?" remarked my neighbour, so it must have
been conspicuous. One could see Major Vandyke consciously absorbing
Diana, throwing over her head a veil of his own magnetism, as if to hide
her in it from other men, and make her forget their existence.

As for Di, she behaved perfectly, if she wished to fascinate and
tantalize a flirt, such as Sidney Vandyke was said to be. She let
herself seem to fall under his spell, and then suddenly slipped gently
away, turning to Captain March who sat at her other side. She would talk
to him in a friendly, intimate way, in a low voice, with little happy
outbursts of laughter over their reminiscences of a year ago; then, half
apologetically, she would turn back to Vandyke again, raising and
letting fall her eyelashes in a way entirely her own, which, somehow,
gives the effect of a blush. It was Victorian, or Edwardian at latest,
but much more useful than any substitute girls have invented since. That
night began the battle which was to have so strange a finish.

I don't know if Major Vandyke was serious at first. Perhaps he wanted no
more than a good flirtation with a pretty girl, one of the prettiest he
had ever seen, and desperately loved by a brother officer. You see, he
had probably heard already from Kitty Main, who told everything she knew
and a great deal she didn't know, that Captain March was in love with
Di, just as we heard from the same source that Major Vandyke was jealous
of his junior because of flying exploits and honours. I think, though,
that from the moment they met, Di never meant to let the man go free.
She saw that he was flirting, and was angry that he should dare. This
put her on her mettle; and Diana on her mettle was and ever will be
formidable, because of her cleverness, which never lets the mettle show.
She determined that Sidney Vandyke should fall in love--over ears and
eyes in love--and he did. But she wasn't satisfied even with that. She
couldn't bear to have Eagle March escape, and perhaps be snapped up