"Buntingford looks twice as old as he need!" said Geoffrey French,
lighting a cigarette as he and Helena stepped out of the drawing-room
window after dinner into the May world outside--a world which lay steeped
in an after-glow of magical beauty. "What's wrong, I wonder! Have you
been plaguing him, Helena?" The laughing shot was fired purely at random.
But the slight start and flush it produced in Helena struck him.

"I see nothing wrong with him," said Helena, a touch of defiance in her
voice. "But of course it's extraordinarily difficult to get on with him."

"With Philip!--the jolliest, kindest chap going! What do you mean?"

"All right. It's no good talking to anybody with a _parti pris_!"

"No--but seriously, Helena--what's the matter? Why, you told me you only
began the new arrangement two days ago."

"Exactly. And there's been time already for a first-class quarrel. Time
also for me to see that I shall never, never get on with him. I don't
know how we are to get through the two years!"

"_Well_!" ejaculated her companion. "In Heaven's name, what has he
been doing?"

Helena shrugged her shoulders. She was striding beside him like a young
Artemis--in white, with a silver star in her hair, and her short skirts
beaten back from her slender legs and feet by the evening wind. Geoffrey
French, who had had a classical education, almost looked for the quiver
and the bow. He was dazzled at once, and provoked. A magnificent