"Why should he be?" asked Helena imperiously.

"I can't tell you. No one can. It's just what those people think who know him best. Well, that's one fact about him--that his _men_ friends feel they could no more torment a wounded soldier, than worry Buntingford--if they could help it. Then there are other facts that no one knows unless they've worked in Philip's office, where all the men clerks and all the women typists just adore him! I happen to know a good deal about it. I could tell you things--"

"For Heaven's sake, don't!" cried Helena impatiently. "What does it matter? He may be a saint--with seven haloes--for those that don't cross him. But _I_ want my freedom!"--a white foot beat the ground impatiently--"and he stands in the way."

"Freedom to compromise yourself with a scoundrel like Donald! What _can_ you know about such a man--compared with what Philip knows?"

"That's just it--I _want_ to know--" said Helena in her most stubborn voice. "This is a world, now, in which we've all got to know,--both the bad and the good of it. No more taking it on trust from other people! Let us learn it for ourselves."

"Helena!--you're quite mad!" said the young man, exasperated.

"Perhaps I am. But it's a madness you can't cure." And springing to her feet, she sent a call across the lawn--"Peter!" A slim boy who was walking beside the "babe" of seventeen, some distance away, turned sharply at the sound, and running across the grass pulled up in front of Helena.

"Well?--here I am."

"Shall we go and look at the lake? You might pull me about a little."

"Ripping!" said the youth joyously. "Won't you want a cloak?"

"No--it's so hot. Shall we ask Miss Luton?"

Peter made a face.

"Why should we?"

Helena laughed, and they went off together in the direction of a strip of silver under distant trees on which the moon was shining.

French walked away towards the girlish figure now deserted.

Helena watched him out of the corner of her eyes, saw the girl's eager greeting, and the disappearance of the two in the woody walk that bordered the lawn. Then she noticed a man sitting by himself not far away, with a newspaper on his knee.

"Suppose we take Mr. Horne, Peter?"

"Don't let's take anybody!" said the boy. "And anyway Horne's a nuisance just now. He talks you dead with strikes--and nationalization--and labour men--and all that rot. Can't we ever let it alone? I want to talk to _you_, Helena. I say, you are ripping in that dress! You're just _divine_, Helena!" The girl laughed, her sweetest, most rippling laugh.

"Go on like that, Peter. You can't think how nice it sounds--especially after Geoffrey's been lecturing for all he's worth."

"Lecturing? Oh well, if it comes to that, I've got my grievance too, Helena. We'll have it out, when I've found the boat."

"Forewarned!" said Helena, still laughing. "Perhaps I won't come."

"Oh, yes, you will," said the boy confidently. "I believe you know perfectly well what it's about. You've got a guilty conscience, Miss Helena!"

Helena said nothing, till they had pushed the boat out from the reeds and the water-lilies, and she was sitting with the steering ropes in her hands opposite a boy in his shirt sleeves, with the head and face of a cherub, and the spare frame of an athlete, who was devouring her with his eyes.

"Are you quite done with the Army, Peter?"

"Quite. Got out a month ago. You come to me, Helena, if you want any advice about foreign loans--eh? I can tell you a thing or two."

"Are you going to be very rich?"

"Well, I'm pretty rich already," said the boy candidly. "It seems beastly to be wanting more. But my uncles would shove me into the Bank. I couldn't help it."

"You'll never look so nice as you did in your khaki, Peter. What have you done with all your ribbons?"

"What, the decorations? Oh, they're kicking about somewhere."

"You're not to let your Victoria Cross kick about, as you call it," said Helena severely. "By the way, Peter, you've never told me yet--Oh, I saw the bit in the _Times_. But I want _you_ to tell me about it. Won't you?"

She bent forward, all softness, her beautiful eyes on her companion.

"No!" said Peter with energy--"_never_!"

She considered him.

"Was it so awful?" she asked under her breath.

"For God's sake, don't ask questions!" said the boy angrily. "You know I want to forget it. I shall never be quite right till I do forget it."

She was silent. It was his twin brother he had tried to save--staggering back through a British barrage with the wounded man on his shoulders--only to find, as he stumbled into the trench, that he had been carrying the dead. He himself had spent six months in hospital from the effects of wounds and shock. He had emerged to find himself a V. V. and A. D. C. to his Army Commander; and apparently as gay and full of fun as before. But his adoring mother and sisters knew very well that there were sore spots in Peter.

Helena realized that she had touched one. She bent forward presently, and laid her own hand on one of the hands that were handling the sculls.

"Dear Peter!"

He bent impetuously, and kissed the hand before she could withdraw it.

"Don't you play with me, Helena," he said passionately. "I'm not a child, though I look it ... Now, then, let's have it out."

They had reached the middle of the pond, and were drifting across a moonlit pathway, on either side of which lay the shadow of deep woods, now impenetrably dark. The star in Helena's hair glittered in the light, and the face beneath it, robbed of its daylight colour, had become a study in black and white, subtler and more lovely than the real Helena.

"Why did you do it, Helena?" said Peter suddenly.

"Do what?"

"Why did you behave to me as you did, at the Arts Ball? Why did you cut me, not once--but twice--three times--for that _beast_ Donald?"

Helena laughed.

"Now _you're_ beginning!" she said, as she lazily trailed her hand in the water. "It's really comic!"

"What do you mean?"

"Only that I've already quarrelled with Cousin Philip--and Geoffrey--about Lord Donald--so if you insist on quarrelling too, I shall have no friends left."

"Damn Donald! It's like his impudence to ask you to dance at all. It made me sick to see you with him. He's the limit. Well, but--I'm not going to quarrel about Donald, Helena--I'm not going to quarrel about anything.

I'm going to have my own say--and you can't escape this time--you witch!"