He looked at the white hand—at the white arm so beautifully molded that a sculptor would have sighed over it in despair at his inability to imitate it, and he still held out his hand.
"I do not mind the flour," he said, not as Mr. Adelstone would have said it, but simply, naturally.
Stella gave him one small taper finger and he took it and held it for a moment, his eyes smiling into hers; then he relinquished it, with not a word of commonplace compliment, but in silence, and turned to Mr. Etheridge.
"It is quite hopeless to ask you to forgive me for interrupting you I know, so I won't ask," he said, and there was in his voice, Stella noticed, a frank candor that was almost boyish but full of respect. At once it seemed to intimate that he had known and honored the old man since he, Leycester, was a boy.
"How are you, my lord?" said Mr. Etheridge, giving him his long, thin hand, but still keeping a hold, as it were, on his beloved easel. "Taking the dogs for a walk? Are they safe? Take care, Stella!"
For Stella was kneeling down in the midst of them, making friends with the huge mastiff, much to the jealous disgust of the others, who were literally crowding and pushing round her.
Lord Leycester looked round and was silent for a moment; his eyes fixed on the kneeling girl rather than on the dogs. Then he said, suddenly:
"They are quite safe," and then he added, for Stella's behalf, "they are quite safe, Miss Etheridge."
Stella turned her face toward him.