tell him and I can't tell any one--any one but
you, Tabs. I want him so much that I'm ashamed sometimes. I wouldn't
have my people know it, so you must stick by me. Do at least as much for
me as you promised to do for Maisie--stay with me till I can forget
him." And then she added ruefully, "It isn't much fun for you after all
you'd expected."

He couldn't afford to let her become emotional. Riders and smart
equipages were passing. Several times already they had been recognized.
The introduction of Maisie's name supplied him with a loophole. "Mrs.
Lockwood rather adds to our complication. If I'm not engaged to you and
I see something of her, your father will never understand. If I were
your father, I wouldn't. To be perfectly frank, he thinks already that
I'm lenient to Maisie only because she's good-looking----"

Terry didn't permit him to get further. "Daddy's probably right. Be
honest, Tabs. Would you have stood up for her, if you'd found her fat
and forty? Of course you wouldn't. Maisie's a dear, but she's dangerous.
She can't help being dangerous; it's half her attraction. By the way,
we've been walking entirely in the wrong direction."

They had come out by Hyde Park Corner. "How do you make that out?" he
asked. "I thought we would lunch at the Ritz."

She began to apologize. "Before I met you this morning, I'd arranged for
us to lunch with her--I mean with Maisie. You don't mind, do you? I was
speaking with her over the phone and she said we must come because she
didn't feel safe."

"She said that to you, too! She said the same thing to me. But you and
I, do we want her?"

Terry nodded, making her eyes wide. "We'll all make each other more
safe. That's what friends are for. I told her we'd be at her house by
one."

"If you told her that----" He was trying to discover whether he was
relieved or disappointed. With an eagerness which it was hard to account
for, he was wondering whether Lady Dawn would be there. He pulled out
his watch. "Twelve-forty-five. We can just do it in a taxi. If you told
her that, we'd better stick to your plans."

He hailed a driver who was passing and helped her into the cab.

II

As he and Terry chugged their way to Mulberry Tree Court he eyed her,
sitting beside him. Would he ever get her? If he did, would she prove to
be one of his really big things? All men must have thought that their
wives would be the really big things in their lives before they married
them. How man