The owner of both voices then turns an appealing pair of brown eyes upon Daphne, who is sitting on the other side of the fireplace, engaged in the task of amusing her four-year-old daughter.
"We'll see," she replies after the immemorial practice of mothers.... "And suddenly," she continues to the impatient auditor on her lap, "his furry skin fell away, and his great teeth disappeared, and he stood up there straight and beautiful, in shining armour. He was a fairy prince, after all! Brian, dear, tumble out of that arm-chair. Here is dad."
Daphne must have quick ears, for a full half-minute elapses before the door opens and a figure appears in the dim light at the end of the room. Apparently the darkness does not trouble him, for he circumnavigates a round table and a revolving bookcase without hesitation, and finally drops into the arm-chair recently vacated by his son.
"Brian Vereker Carr," inquires a small and respectful voice at his elbow, "do you think dad will play with you to-night?"
"I am sure he will," comes a confident reply from the same quarter, "if you give him two minutes to light his pipe in, and refrain from unseemly demon—demonstrations of affection in the meanwhile."
"It's a hard world for parents," grumbles Juggernaut, getting up. "Where is my tobacco-pouch?"
His hand falls upon the corner of the mantelpiece, but encounters nothing there but a framed photograph of a sun-burned young man on a polo-pony—Uncle Ally, to be precise.
"Now where on earth is that pouch? I know I left it on the left-hand end of the mantelpiece after lunch."
There is a shriek of delight at this from Brian, in which Miss Carr joins, for the great daily joke of the Carr family is now being enacted.
"Where can it be?" wails Juggernaut. "Under the hearthrug, perhaps? No, not there! In the blotting-pad? No, not there! I know! I expect it is behind the coal-box."