a flirt.' For she could not
altogether help remembering herself at the same age.

Summoned thus unexpectedly, Barbara, her lips very firmly pressed
together, took her stand, coolly enough, by her father's writing-table.

Seeing her suddenly appear, Lord Valleys instinctively relaxed his frown;
his experience of men and things, his thousands of diplomatic hours,
served to give him an air of coolness and detachment which he was very
far from feeling. In truth he would rather have faced a hostile mob than
his favourite daughter in such circumstances. His tanned face with its
crisp grey moustache, his whole head indeed, took on, unconsciously, a
more than ordinarily soldier-like appearance. His eyelids drooped a
little, his brows rose slightly.

She was wearing a blue wrap over her evening frock, and he seized
instinctively on that indifferent trifle to begin this talk.

"Ah! Babs, have you been out?"

Alive to her very finger-nails, with every nerve tingling, but showing no
sign, Barbara answered:

"No; on the roof of the tower."

It gave her a real malicious pleasure to feel the perplexity beneath her
father's dignified exterior. And detecting that covert mockery, Lord
Valleys said dryly:

"Star-gazing?"

Then, with that sudden resolution peculiar to him, as though he were
bored with having to delay and temporize, he added:

"Do you know, I doubt whether it's wise to make appointments in
confectioner's shops when Ann is in London."

The dangerous little gleam in Barbara's eyes escaped his vision but not
that of Lady Valleys, who said at once:

"No doubt you had the best of reasons, my dear."

Barbara curled her lip. Had it not been for the scene they had been
through that day with Miltoun, and for their very real anxiety, both
would have seen, then, that while their daughter was in this mood, least
said was soonest mended. But their nerves were not quite within control;
and with more than a touch of impatience Lord Valleys ejaculated:

"It doesn't appear to you, I suppose, to require any explanation?"

Barbara answered:

"No."

"Ah!" said Lord Valleys: "I see. An explanation can be had no doubt from
the gentleman whose sense of proportion was such as to cause him to
suggest such a thing."

"He did not suggest it. I did."

Lord Valleys' eyebrows rose still higher.

"Indeed!" he said.

"Geoffrey!" murmured Lady Valleys, "I thought I was to talk to Babs."

"It would no doubt be wiser."