You can do what you like. I give in. I dare say your
woman's instinct is right. And, besides, I can't leave you. And now, my
darling, lovely, exquisite angel you will go--AT ONCE!"

"Oh, Frank, forgive me."

A violently loud knock startled them from each other's arms. There was
another cab at the door.

"Keep still. Keep over here, Sylvia," commanded Woodville.

From the window he saw, standing on the steps, Savile, in his Eton suit.
He smiled and waved his hand to the boy.

"It's Savile. I'll open the door. It'll be all right. I expect he
followed you."

In two seconds Sylvia was composed and calm, looking round at the
pictures in her chinchilla cloak.

Savile followed his host up, laughing vaguely, and said when he saw
Sylvia, in a rather marked way--

"Ah! You didn't believe me when I told you I'd come and fetch you! But,
you see, here I am."

"Sweet of you, dear," said Sylvia.

"And a fine place it is--well worth coming to see, isn't it?" said
Frank, laughing a great deal.

"Well, we'd better be off. I kept the cab because of dining at Aunt
William's to-night. You know, Sylvia, we're late."

"Oh, yes, dear. I'd almost given you up."

As they went to the door, Savile suddenly turned round, and having
decided a debate in his mind, said--

"I know all about it. I congratulate you, Woodville. But we'll keep it
dark a bit yet, eh?"

Savile thought his knowing of the engagement made it more conventional.

The brother and sister drove off.

Sylvia was silent. Savile did not say a single word until they nearly
reached home. Then he remarked casually--

"As I found out where you'd gone, I thought it would sort of look
better, eh, for me to fetch you? Didn't mean to be a bore or anything."

"Oh, Savile dear, _thank_ you! I'll never----"

"Yes; it's not going to happen again. Go and dress, old girl. Wear your
pink. Motor'll be round in half an hour; heaps of time. I'm going too,
you know--at Aunt William's."

CHAPTER XIII

AT MRS. OGILVIE'S

"I know what's the matter with you, Vera," said Felicity decidedly, as
she sat down in her friend's flat in Cadogan Place. "It's that you
haven't got the personal note!"

"I?" said Vera indignantly.

Mrs. Ogilvie was a very pretty dark woman of about thirty, who minimised
her good looks and added to her apparent age by dressing in the style
which had always suited her. Her dainty drawing-rooms were curiously
conventional--the natural result of _ca