To his surprise Lloyd made no answer, but, setting her lips together angrily, rose and went into the house, her head high and her cheeks flushed.
"Whew!" he exclaimed, with a soft whistle. "What hornet's nest have I stirred up now?"
Joyce and Betty exchanged glances, each waiting for the other to make the explanation. Then Joyce asked: "Didn't you see the way Bernice snubbed her last night at the gate, when we left The Beeches?"
"Nary a snub did I see. It must have happened when I was groping around in the path for something that I had flipped out of my pocket with my handkerchief. It rang on the ground like a piece of money, and I feared me I had lost one of me ducats. What did she do?"
"I can't tell you now," said Joyce, hurriedly, lowering her voice. "Here come Phil and Doctor Bradford."
"No matter," he answered, airily. "I have no curiosity whatsoever. It's a trait of character entirely lacking in my make-up." Then he motioned toward Mary, who was sitting in a hammock, cutting the pages of a new magazine. "Does she know?"
Joyce nodded, and feeling that they meant her, Mary looked up inquiringly. Rob beckoned to her ingratiatingly.
"Come into the garden, Maud," he said in a low tone. "I would have speech with thee."
Laughing at his foolishness, but in a flutter of pleasure, Mary sprang up to follow him to the rustic seat midway down the avenue. As Joyce's parting glance had not forbidden it, she was soon answering his questions to the best of her ability.
"You see," he explained, "it's not out of curiosity that I ask all this. It's simply as a means of precaution. I can't keep myself out of hot water unless I know how the land lies."