"Are there many parties like this in London? Are the ladies asked, and
don't come? I--I don't--understand!"

Ashe looked at her kindly.

"There is no other hostess in London as clever as your mother," he
declared, and then tried to change the subject; but she paid no heed.

"The other day, at Aunt Grosville's," she said, slowly, "I asked if my
two cousins might come to-night, and they looked at me as though I were
mad! Oh, _do_ talk to me!" She came impulsively nearer, and Ashe noticed
that Darrell, standing against the doorway of communication, looked
round at them in amusement. "I liked your face--the very first moment
when I saw you across the room. Do you know--you're--you're very
handsome!" She drew back, her eyes fixed gravely, intently upon him.

For the first time Ashe was conscious of annoyance.

"I hope you won't mind my saying so"--his tone was a little short--"but
in this country we don't say those things. They're not--quite polite."

"Aren't they?" Her eyebrows arched themselves and her lips fell in
penitence. "I always called my French cousin, Henri la Fresnay, _beau!_
I am sure he liked it!" The accent was almost plaintive.

Ashe's natural impulse was to say that if so the French cousin must be
an ass. But all in a moment he found himself seized with a desire to
take her little hands in his own and press them--she looked such a
child, so exquisite, and so forlorn. And he did in fact bend forward