Sir Guy pours her out a cup of tea, carefully, but silently. Archie, gloomy, but attentive, places before her what she most fancies: Cyril gets her a chair; Taffy brings her some toast: all are fondly dancing attendance on the little spoiled fairy.
"What are you looking at, Taffy?" asks she, presently, meeting her cousin's blue eyes, that so oddly resemble her own, fixed upon her immovably.
"At you. There is something wrong with your hair," replies he, unabashed: "some of the pins are coming out. Stay steady, and I'll wheel you into line in no time." So saying, he adjusts the disorderly hair-pin; while Chetwoode and Chesney, looking on, are consumed with envy.
"Thank you, dear," says Lilian, demurely, giving his hand a little loving pat: "you are worth your weight in gold. Be sure you push it in again during the day, if you see it growing unruly. What a delicious morning it is!" glancing out of the window; "too desirable perhaps. I hope none of us will break our necks."
"Funky already, Lil?" says Taffy, with unpardonable impertinence. "Never mind, darling, keep up your heart; I'm fit as a fiddle myself, and will so far sacrifice my life as to promise you a lead whenever a copper brings me in your vicinity. I shall keep you in mind, never fear."
"I consider your remarks beneath notice, presumptuous boy," says Miss Chesney, with such a scornful uplifting of her delicate face as satisfies Taffy, who, being full of mischief, passes on to bestow his pleasing attentions on the others of the party. Chesney first attracts his notice. He is standing with his back to a screen, and has his eyes fixed in moody contemplation on the floor. Melancholy on this occasion has evidently marked him for her own.
"What's up with you, old man? you look suicidal," says Mr. Musgrave, stopping close to him, and giving him a rattling slap on the shoulder that rather takes the curl out of him, leaving him limp, but full of indignation.
"Look here," he says, in an aggrieved tone, "I wish you wouldn't do that, you know. Your hands, small and delicate as they are,"—Taffy's hands, though shapely, are decidedly large,—"can hurt. If you go about the world with such habits you will infallibly commit murder sooner or later: I should bet on the sooner. One can never be sure, my dear fellow, who has heart-disease and who has not."
"Heart-disease means love with most fellows," says the irrepressible Taffy, "and I have noticed you aren't half a one since your return from London." At this mal à propos speech both Lilian and Chesney change color, and Guy, seeing their confusion, becomes miserable in turn, so that breakfast is a distinct failure, Cyril and Musgrave alone being capable of animated conversation.