Mr. Evringham, gazing at his visitor in mute astonishment, was much
disconcerted to receive a confiding gesture of raised shoulders and
eyebrows, which, combined with a little smile, plainly signified that
they had been caught. He took up his newspaper mechanically.

He had never had a daughter, and caresses had seldom passed between
him and his children. His duties as a family man had always been
perfunctory. He was tingling now from the surprise of Jewel's action,
the feeling of the little gingham clad arms about his neck, the touch
of the rose-leaf skin as she swept his cheek and ear in her emphatic
half-whisper.

His mental processes were stiff when the subject related to things
apart from the stock market, his horses, and golf, but he was finally
understanding that his granddaughter had come to Bel-Air, prepared by
accounts which had cast a glamour over everything and everybody in it.
She had evidently found Mrs. Forbes fall below her expectations. He had
been disillusioned concerning Mrs. Evringham and Eloise. As yet the halo
with which he himself had been invested was intact. Was it to remain
so? He still saw how foolish he had been to send for the child. He
still wished, of course, that she was in Chicago now, instead of sitting
across there from him in crisp short skirts, her head and shoulders only
showing above the high table, and a little smile of good understanding
waiting for him each time he looked up.

He had done very well during a lifetime without being hugged, yet the
innocent incense, which had been rising spontaneously before him ever
since the child entered the dining-room, had a strangely sweet savor.
Such was the joy of breakfast alone with him that it made her feel as if