"My dear Hannah!"
"Your dear nothing!" she interrupted ruthlessly.
"You just sit down by the side of your daughter there and let me tell you both what I think of you and what I'm going to do about it."
"I think," I suggested, "a little taxi drive——Your mother and father no doubt have a great deal to say to one another, and you can receive your little lecture later."
Eve assented at once; and Mrs. Bundercombe, for some reason or other, only entered a faint protest against our departure. It was about five o'clock in the afternoon and the streets were crowded with every description of vehicle. The sun was still warm; there was a faint pink light in the sky— a perfume of lilac in the air from the window-boxes and flower-barrows. I took Eve's fingers in mine and held them. I think she knew that something in the nature of an inquisition was coming, for she sat very demure, her eyes fixed on the road ahead.
"Eve," I asked, "how about Mrs. Samuelson's jewels?"
"They were returned to her from 'a repentant criminal,'" Eve murmured.
"And the forged banknotes made by the young man in the Adelphi?"
"They were all destroyed as fast as father could buy them," she explained.
"He has found the boy a post now with some printer in America."
"And the two thousand pounds at the gaming club—that first night?"