"I'm a.s.s enough to be much obliged," he said. "And now, before you go, what the devil did you shoot in the woods?"

"Miss Cardross got a gobbler--about the biggest bird I ever saw. Eudo Stent skinned it and Mr. Cardross is going to have it set up in New York. It's a wonderful--"

"Didn't _you_ shoot anything?"

"Oh, I a.s.sa.s.sinated a few harmless birds," said Hamil absently; and walked out into the corridor. "I've got to go over a lot of acc.u.mulated letters and things," he called back. "See you later, Malcourt."

There was a ma.s.s of mail, bills, plans, and office reports for him lying on the hall table. He gathered these up and hastened down the stairway.

On the terrace below he found Mrs. Cardross, and stopped to tell her what a splendid trip they had, and how beautifully Shiela had shot.

"You did rather well yourself," drawled Mrs. Cardross, with a bland smile. "Shiela says so."

"Oh, yes, but my shooting doesn't compare with Shiela's. I never knew such a girl; I never believed they existed--"

"They are rare," nodded the matron. "I am glad everybody finds my little daughter so admirable in the field."

"Beyond comparison in the field and everywhere," said Hamil, with a cordiality so laboriously frank that Mrs. Cardross raised her eyes--an instant only--then continued sorting the skeins of silk in her voluminous lap.

Shiela appeared in sight among the roses across the lawn; and, as Mr.

Cardross came out on the terrace to light his after-breakfast cigar, Hamil disappeared in the direction of the garden where Shiela now stood under the bougainvillia, leisurely biting into a sapodilla.

Mrs. Cardross nodded to her white-linen-clad husband, who looked very handsome with the silvered hair at his temples accentuating the clear, deep tan of his face.

"You are burnt, Neville. Did you and the children have a good time?"

"A good time! Well, just about the best in my life--except when I'm with you. Too bad you couldn't have been there. Shiela shoots like a demon.

You ought to have seen her among the quail, and later, in the saw-gra.s.s, pulling down mallard and duskies from the sky-high overhead range! I tell you, Amy, she's the cleverest, sweetest, cleanest sportsman I ever saw afield. Gray, of course, stopped his birds very well. He has a lot of b.u.t.terflies to show you, and--'longicorns,' I believe he calls those beetles with enormous feelers. Little Tiger is a treasure; Eudo and the others did well--"

"And Mr. Hamil?" drawled his wife.

"I _like_ him. It's a verdict, dear. You were quite right; he _is_ a nice boy--rather a lovable boy. I've discovered no cloven hoof about him. He doesn't shoot particularly well, but his field manners are faultless."

His wife, always elaborately upholstered, sat in her wide reclining chair, plump, jewelled fingers busy with a silk necktie for Hamil, her pretty blue eyes raised at intervals to scan her husband's animated features.

"Does Gray like him as much as ever, Neville?"

"O Lord, Gray adores him, and I like him, and you knit neckties for him, and Jessie doses him, and Cecile quotes him--"

"And Shiela?"

"Oh, Shiela seems to like him," said Cardross genially. His wife raised her eyes, then calmly scrutinized her knitting.

"And Mr. Hamil?"

"What about him, dear?"

"Does he seem to like Shiela?"

Her husband glanced musingly out over the lawn where, in their white flannels, Shiela and Hamil were now seated together under a brilliant j.a.panese lawn umbrella, examining the pile of plans, reports and blue-prints which had acc.u.mulated in Hamil's office since his absence.

"He--seems to like her," nodded Cardross, "I'm sure he does. Why not?"

"They were together a good deal, you said last night."

"Yes; but either Gray or I or one of the guides--"

"Of course. Then you don't think--"

Cardross waited and finally looked up. "What, dear?"

"That there is anything more than a sensible friendship--"

"Between Shiela and Garret Hamil?"

"Yes; we were not discussing the Emperor of China."

Cardross laughed and glanced sideways at the lawn umbrella.

"I--don't--know."

His wife raised her brows but not her head.

"Why, Neville?"

"Why what?"

"Your apparent doubt as to the significance of their friendship."

"Dear--I don't know much about those things."

His wife waited.

"Hamil is so nice to everybody; and I've not noticed how he is with other young girls," continued her husband restlessly. "He does seem to tag after Shiela.... Once or twice I thought--or it seemed to me--or rather--"

His wife waited.

"Well, he seemed rather impressed by her field qualities," concluded Cardross weakly.

His wife waited.

Her husband lit a cigar very carefully: "That's all I noticed, dear."

Mrs. Cardross laid the narrow bit of woven blue silk on her knee and smoothed it reflectively.

"Neville!"

"Yes, dear."