"Not half so funny as when he doesn't like," returned Barbara. "You know, Daddy, I think B will get over it pretty soon, if we leave her alone. I believe she'd begun to like him not so much." "You observed that, did you?" said her father. "Well, if it is so it will make it all the easier for her." Beatrix had gone to bed when they got in. Miss Waterhouse said that she had taken it better than she had expected. She had been relieved at getting away from Surley, and the necessity to play a part, had cried a little in the car going home, but not as if she were likely to break down, and had said she didn't want to talk about it. But Caroline might go to her when she came in. "Give her my love and a kiss," said Grafton, "and come down and talk to me afterwards. It's early yet." CHAPTER XXVI THE LAST Caroline came down to him in her dressing-gown, with her fair hair hanging in a plait down her back, as she had been wont to do as a child when he had wanted her, and she had been so pleased and proud to keep him company. Latterly he had not seemed to want her quite so much. His easy life had been troubled, as it had never been before in her recollection, except after her mother's death, and then she had known, child as she was, that she had been able to give him consolation. In this so much smaller trouble she knew she had not sufficed for him. One soul, however deeply loved, cannot heal the wounds dealt to love by another, though it may assuage them. He had wanted Beatrix's love more than hers, because hers had never been in question. But there was no depth of jealousy in her true tender nature, only little ruffles on the surface. She had felt for him. If he got back to be what he wanted with Beatrix, he would be not less to her but more. And he was most of what she wanted at that time. She sat down on the arm of his chair before the fire, and hoped he would take her on his knee, as he had always done when she had kept him company as a child. Perhaps that was why she had prepared herself for the night before coming to him. He gazed into the fire, and waited for her to speak. "She sent you her love," she said, her lip and her voice quivering a little with her disappointment. He roused himself and looked up at her, catching the note of emotion, but not understanding its cause, then drew her on to his knee and kissed her. "My darling," he said, and she put her face to his neck and cried a little, but not from unhappiness. "I'm very silly," she said, searching for the handkerchief in the pocket of his smoking-jacket, and drying her eyes with it. "There's nothing to cry about, really. She's going to be all right. I'm glad it's all over, and so will she be very soon." Then she gave a little laugh, and said: "We've had a hog of a time, haven't we, Dad?" It was one of his own phrases, thus consecrated for use in the family on all suitable occasions. That this could be considered one was her rejection of unnecessary emotion.