"I feel sure I am going to cry."
"I promise," says Sir Guy, instantly, laughing in spite of himself, and letting his own hand close with unconscious force over hers for a moment. Whereupon Miss Chesney's lachrymose expression vanishes as if by magic, while a smile bright and triumphant illuminates her face in its stead.
"Thank you," she says, delightedly, and trips toward the door eager to impart her good news. Upon the threshold, however, she pauses, and glances back at him coquettishly, perhaps a trifle maliciously, from under her long heavily-fringed lids.
"I knew I should win the day," she says, teasingly, "although you don't believe in love. Nevertheless, I thank you again, and"—raising her head, and holding out one hand to him with a sweet bizarre grace all her own—"I would have you know I don't think you half such a bad old guardy after all!"
* * * * * * *
Almost at this moment Cyril enters his mother's boudoir, where, to his astonishment, he finds her without companions.
"All alone, Madre?" he says, airily, putting on his gayest manner and his most fetching smile to hide the perturbation that in reality he is feeling. His heart is in his boots, but he wears a very gallant exterior.
"Yes," replies Lady Chetwoode, looking up from her work, "and very dull company I find myself. Have you come to enliven me a little? I hope so: I have been gêne to the last degree for quite an hour."
"Where is the inevitable Florence?"
"In the drawing-room, with Mr. Boer. I can't think what she sees in him, but she appears to value his society highly. To-day he has brought her some more church music to try over, and I really wish he wouldn't. Anything more afflicting than chants tried over and over again upon the piano I can't conceive. They are very bad upon the organ, but on the piano! And sometimes he will insist on singing them with her!"