"Then, for goodness' sake, put it. Supposing they sent those awful Futurist things; why, he'd frighten me into fits. Can't you see Horatio stalking in out of his dressing-room, all magenta blobs and forked lightning?" "I haven't seen him at all yet," said Barbara. "Well, you wait.... Does my humming annoy you?" "Not a bit. I like it. It's such a happy sound." "I always do it," said Fanny, "when I'm happy." You could hear feet, feet in heavy soled boots, clanking on the drive that ringed the grass-plot and the sundial; the eager feet of a young man. Fanny turned her head, listening. "There _is_ Ralph," she said. "Come in, Ralph!" The young man stood in the low, narrow doorway, filling it with his slender height and breadth. He looked past Fanny, warily, into the far corner of the room, and when his eyes found Barbara at her bureau they smiled. "Oh, _come_ in," Fanny said. "He isn't here. He won't be till Friday. This is Ralph Bevan, Barbara; and this is Barbara Madden, Ralph." He bowed, still smiling, as if he saw something irrepressibly amusing in her presence there. "Yes," said Fanny to the smile. "Your successor." "I congratulate you, Miss Madden." "Don't be an ironical beast. She's just said she couldn't bear to think she'd done you out of your job." "Well, I couldn't," said Barbara. "That's very nice of you. But you didn't do me out of anything. It was the act of God." "It was Horatio's act. Not that Miss Madden meant any reflection on his justice and his mercy." "I don't know about his justice," Ralph said. "But he was absolutely merciful when he fired me out." "Is it so awfully hard then?" said Barbara. "You may not find it so." "Oh, but I'm going to be Mrs. Waddington's companion, too." "You'll be all right then. They wouldn't let _me_ be that." "He means you'll be safe, dear. You won't be fired out whatever happens." "Whatever sort of secretary I am?" "Yes. She can be any sort she likes, in reason, can't she?" "She can't be a worse one than I was, anyhow." Barbara was aware that he had looked at her, a long look, half thoughtful, half amused, as if he were going to say something different, something that would give her a curious light on herself, and had thought better of it. Fanny Waddington was protesting. "My dear boy, it wasn't for incompetence. She's simply dying to know what you _did_ do." "You can tell her." "He wanted to write Horatio's book for him, and Horatio wouldn't let him. That was all." "Oh, well, _I_ shan't want to write it," Barbara said. "We thought perhaps you wouldn't," said Fanny. But Barbara had turned to her bureau, affecting a discreet absorption in her list. And presently Ralph Bevan went out into the garden with Fanny to gather more tulips. II 1