He knew he'd seen the girl somewhere. At one of the Washington parties, or in the newspapers. Her face was unmistakable; it was the sort of face that a man never forgets once he glimpses it--thin, puckish, with wide-set grey eyes that seemed both somber and secretly amused, a full, sensitive mouth, and blonde hair, exceedingly fine, cropped close about her ears. She was eating her breakfast, a rolled up newspaper by her plate, and as she looked up, her eyes were not warm. She just stared at Shandor angrily for a moment, then set down her coffee cup and threw the paper to the floor with a slam. "You're Shandor, I suppose." Shandor looked at the paper, then back at her. "Yes, I'm Tom Shandor. But you're not Mrs. Ingersoll--" "A profound observation. Mother isn't interested in seeing anyone this morning, particularly you." She motioned to a chair. "You can talk to me if you want to." Shandor sank down in the proffered seat, struggling to readjust his thinking. "Well," he said finally. "I--I wasn't expecting you--" he broke into a grin--"but I should think you could help. You know what I'm trying to do--I mean, about your father. I want to write a story, and the logical place to start would be with his family--" The girl blinked wide eyes innocently. "Why don't you start with the newspaper files?" she asked, her voice silky. "You'd find all sorts of information about daddy there. Pages and pages--" "No, no-- I don't want that kind of information. You're his daughter, Miss Ingersoll, you could tell me about him as a man. Something about his personal life, what sort of man he was--" She shrugged indifferently, buttered a piece of toast, as Shandor felt most acutely the pangs of his own missed breakfast. "He got up at seven every morning," she said. "He brushed his teeth and ate breakfast. At nine o'clock the State Department called for him--" Shandor shook his head unhappily. "No, no, that's not what I mean." "Then perhaps you'd tell me precisely what you _do_ mean?" Her voice was clipped and hard. Shandor sighed in exasperation. "The personal angle. His likes and dislikes, how he came to formulate his views, his relationship with his wife, with you--" "He was a kind and loving father," she said, her voice mocking. "He loved to read, he loved music--oh, yes, put that down, he was a _great_ lover of music. His wife was the apple of his eye, and he tried, for all the duties of his position, to provide us with a happy home life--" "Miss Ingersoll." She stopped in mid-sentence, her grey eyes veiled, and shook her head slightly. "That's not what you want, either?"