"Oh, well!" she said. "I'm off to consult Selinar-Ann as to whether it's to be bread-and-butter pudding or a baked roly-poly; expect me back, or what remains of me, in an hour."
Carefully rumpling her father's already disordered hair, she screwed up his patient face between her hands, kissed him and ran out, singing as she went.
In less than an hour she re-entered the studio, still singing; but the song snapped off suddenly, and she stood just within the doorway, staring with wide-open eyes at a young soldier in khaki who stood on the model's dais, one arm in a sling, the other extended with a sword in the hand, in the kind of attitude beloved by the populace, and forming the picture which bears inevitably the legend, "Charge!"
The young man turned his eyes—he dared not move anything else—and, at sight of the stricken maiden, his tanned face grew the colour of a healthy beetroot.
"Getting on famously, Kit," remarked Mr. Thorold in a preoccupied manner. "Arm a little higher, if you please, Captain——Pardon, didn't catch your name."
"Barnard," said the model, in a small voice quite inconsistent with his fine and manly proportions.
"Ah, thank you! Could you—er—put on something of a scowl? You're wounded, you know, and you're leading a forlorn hope, or something of the sort."
The young man's good-looking face assumed as much of a scowl as it was capable of doing, and Mr. Thorold dashed it on the paper.