Cleopatra held up a finger admonishingly. "You seemed to be talking animatedly enough," she said.
"Yes," Leonetta began, "all about photography, walking tours, and things that don't matter—" Then she felt Miss Mallowcoid's huge cold hand on her arm.
"Leonetta dear, I said something to you a moment ago," lisped the elderly spinster. And again Mrs. Delarayne looked up to try to catch her daughter's reply.
"I'm sorry, Aunt Bella," said the girl, "but really one does not usually expect to be congratulated on a slip of the tongue, and your—" she burst out laughing.
Mrs. Delarayne thereupon resumed her conversation with Agatha Fearwell, as she was now satisfied that Leonetta was both thoroughly recovered and satisfactorily reformed.
"But I did not congratulate you, I—" her aunt persisted.
"Oh, well," Leonetta interrupted, "it really isn't worth discussing."
In any case it was not discussed, for at this juncture the men appeared.
They distributed themselves anything but haphazardly; Sir Joseph, for instance, seating himself by the side of his hostess; Denis Malster between Leonetta and her sister, and Guy and Stephen, as their diffidence suggested, as remotely as possible from the younger women of the party.
"Now, Leonetta," Sir Joseph began, "tell us something about your school life. You are the only one amongst us who has just come from a strange world."