"What--the button? Oh yes, it's right enough! At least, it'll do." And then dinner, according to Harmood, was on the table, and the button lapsed. "Did you find your mother well?" This followed on the heels of soup, concluded. By this time Challis had given up all his little conciliations, and was drifting, a mere log on the current of matrimony. Oh yes!--Marianne had found mamma well--that is, just as usual. She wasn't going to help, evidently. However, he would try yet again, but presently. Presently did not come, apparently, till cigar-time. Then he made a more vigorous attempt. "Well, Polly Anne, I think you might ask me where _I've_ been." "Where _have_ you been?" The amount of concession there was in this was just sufficient to make it impossible to indict the conversation as unendurable, and demand improvement or silence; but not enough to pave the way to cordiality. Challis would probably not have ventured on his last attempt if he had had nothing to report but his visit to Grosvenor Square. But this afternoon excursion, later, had given him confidence. He was able to answer that he had looked in to tea at the Ponsonby-Smiths', or whatever the name was; and what did Polly Anne think? Celia Ponsonby-Smith had got twins. "Celia Robinson, I suppose you mean," said Marianne coldly. "I saw it in the _Telegraph_. Did you go nowhere else?" "In the morning--yes! I went for a book to the London Library, and made a call. Nowhere else this afternoon." "I meant in the morning. Don't spill your coffee. The cup's too full." "No--it's all right. There!" Challis reduced his coffee to safety-point, and was not ungrateful for the slight break in the conversation. He was able to affect a balked readiness to speak, as one whose swallowed coffee has left him free to say the words it interrupted. "I called in at Grosvenor Square." "I see." This is a simple speech enough, but if the _I_ lasts a long time and the _S_ even longer, it expresses diabolical insight. Yet one can say nothing. Challis could only ignore it, and continue: "I told you Judith Arkroyd had had an accident. Or didn't I?" But he knew quite well; and Marianne knew he knew, and merely shook her head. He went on: "Well--she has. And she wasn't able to come to the Acropolis last night." "A bad accident?" Marianne seems determined to keep her words at the fewest. "Nothing very serious! A sprained ankle. She'll have to lay up for it. Not a hanging matter!" "Of course you didn't see her?" "I did. There is nothing to prevent her receiving visitors." "Was she up?" "My dear Marianne! Of course she was up. What do you suppose?"