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She found a large party gathered in the hall at tea on her return. A laugh she knew fell on her ears as she entered, and an instant later she was aware of Charlie springing to meet her, his brown face aglow with the smile of welcome.

“How awfully good to meet you here, Molly!” he said, with that audacious use of her Christian name against which no protest of hers seemed to take any effect.

She shook hands with him and she tried to do it coldly, but his warm grasp was close and lingering. She realised with something of a shock that he really was as glad as he professed to be to see her again.

She went forward to the group around the fire and shook hands with all she knew.

Captain Fisher was the last to receive this attention. He was standing in the background. He moved forward half a pace to greet her. In his own peculiar, dumb fashion he also seemed pleased to meet her there.

He had an untasted cup of tea in his hand which he hastened to pass on to her.

“I shouldn’t accept it if I were you,” laughed Mrs. Langdale. “I saw ten lumps of sugar go into it just now.”

Fisher raised his eyebrows, but made no verbal protest. He never spoke if a gesture would do as well.

Molly accepted the cup of tea with a gracious smile, and Fisher found her a chair and sat silently down beside her.

Molly had plenty to say at all times. Her companion did not embarrass her by his lack of responsiveness as he embarrassed most people. She had a feeling that his reticence did not spring from inattention.

“I am going to let you have the Silent Fish, as Charlie calls him, for partner at dinner,” her hostess said to her later. “You are a positive marvel, Molly. He becomes quite genial under your influence.”

Fisher brightened considerably when he found himself allotted to Molly. He even conversed a little, and went so far as to seek her out in the drawing-room later.

Charlie, who was making tracks in the same direction, turned sharply away when he saw it, and went off to the billiard-room where several of the rest were collected playing pool. He was in uproarious spirits, and the whole gathering was speedily infected thereby.

The evening ended in a boisterous abandonment to childish games, and the party broke up at midnight, exhausted but still merry. Charlie, after an animated sponge-fight with half-a-dozen other sportsmen, finally effaced himself by bolting into Fisher’s bedroom and locking himself in.

To Fisher, who was smoking peacefully by the fire, he made hurried apology, to which Fisher gruffly responded by requesting him to get out.

But Charlie, after listening to the babel dying away down the corridor, turned round with a smile and established himself at comfortable length on Fisher’s bed.

“I want to talk to you, dear old fellow,” he tenderly remarked. “Can you spare me a few moments of your valuable time?”

“Two minutes,” said Fisher with brevity.

“By Jove! What generosity!” ejaculated Charlie, his hands clasped behind his head, his eyes on the ceiling. “It’s rather a delicate matter. However, here goes! Do you seriously mean business, or don’t you? Are you in sober earnest, or aren’t you? Are you badly smitten, or are you only just beginning to hover round the candle? Pardon my mixture of similes! The meaning remains intact.”

Silence followed his somewhat involved speech. After a pause Captain Fisher got up slowly, and turned round to face the boy on his bed.

“Whatever your meaning may be, I don’t fathom it,” he said curtly.

Charlie rolled on to his side to look at him.

“Dense as a London fog,” he murmured.

“You’d better go,” said Fisher, dropping his cigarette into the fire and beginning to undress.

Charlie sat up and watched him with an air of interest. Fisher took no more notice of him. There was no waste of ceremony between these two.