Oh, mendacious Tony! when he knew perfectly well that those "belongings" had been left on that table ever since Lallie's second evening in B. House, and he had smoked there ruthlessly every evening since.
"It doesn't matter in the least," Miss Ford said graciously; "one couldn't smell even tobacco with these overpowering flowers. I really must ask Ford to throw them out; they are enough to give us all hay-fever."
Tony fled.
CHAPTER VII
An hour later Tony sat at his study table offering sacrifices propitiatory to parental anxiety amid clouds of smoke, with a pile of unanswered letters at his elbow.
Lallie peeped in.
"Has she come, Tony?" she whispered.
"She has," he remarked briefly, whereupon Lallie vanished again, with a muttered exclamation.
In the passage she met Mr. Johns on his way to take prep.; she seized him by the arm, whispering beseechingly:
"Come with me to the drawing-room just for a minute, there's a dear kind man. I'm petrified with terror, and Tony's busy. Don't leave me to go in all by myself."