An awkward silence followed her words, which Ingram was the first to break.
"I think, perhaps, you'd best tell now, Nelly," he said quietly.
The girl blushed and covered her eyes for a moment with her hands.
"It's so—so foolish," she said, clenching them with an impatient movement. "Oh, well, if I must, I must.... It was yesterday morning while you were both at breakfast. I ran down, you know, to catch the tide. After I had come out—oh, well, there wasn't a soul in sight—I thought they would all be at breakfast at the Grande Falaise; I was chilly, too, and there was a kind of tune in the sea. So, after I'd taken off my wet bathing-suit, I threw on my kimono and began to practise the last dance Madame de Rudder has been teaching me—you know the one, mother, where she won't let me use my feet as much as I want—out on the sand where it was hard. And then, like a little fool I am, I forgot everything, until I heard some one clapping hands and saying, 'Bravo!'—and I looked up—and there were two men on the dunes, smoking cigars—I suppose they were coming from the golf links to the hotel, and I don't know how long they'd been watching me, and—and," with sudden passion, "I just hate you, Paul, for dragging it out of me when I didn't want to tell."
And Fenella, already overwrought, hid her head in her mother's capacious lap and had her cry out.
Mrs. Barbour stroked the dark head gently, but like the wise old mother bird she was, made no attempt to check the burst of tears.
"Such a dancing girl she is," she murmured complacently, "and she does hate to have it talked about so. Do you know, Mr. Ingram, I only discovered it myself by accident, after it had been going on months and months. Do you remember, dearie, that awful day, the first time I was up after influenza, that Druce got the spot on her nose that the doctor said was erysipelas, and Twyford scalded her arm and hand making a poultice? It's the only time, I do believe, Nelly, I've ever spoken to you crossly."
A muffled voice, "You were horrid, mummy."
"Well, there, I really was, Mr. Ingram. I pushed the child out of the way and said, 'If you can't help, don't hinder. Run upstairs and play with the other ornaments!' I didn't think any more about it, with all that trouble on my hands, till about half an hour afterward, when down comes Miss Rigby with her face white—you know what a coward she is, Nelly—and in her dressing-gown, at nearly twelve! 'Do come up, Mrs. Barbour,' she says, 'I believe Rock has gone mad in the box-room and is dashing himself against the wall.' Oh dear! I ran upstairs with the poker, and what do you think it was, Mr. Ingram. My own crazy child, dancing and waving her arms about. Such a picture of fun as she looked!"
A hand was laid suddenly on her mouth, and a face, very flushed and penitent in its tumbled dark hair, emerged from between the parental knees.