Tim was disposed to dodge Mr. Waddy; but Ira had no quarrel with the hopeful youth, who had in the Halifax affair only done as most men do. It is not worth while, as Mr. Waddy knew, to be permanently disgusted with human beings for acting according to their natures; he knew that character is a compound of blood, breeding, and experience. So he gave Tim a glass of claret and said “_Pax vobiscum_, my lad!” very kindly. Tim, pleased with the patronage of the distinguished stranger, who, with his two friends, and Chin Chin behind his chair, was an object of gaze at the Millard--Tim, elated by such good society, for twenty minutes resolved to reform. At the twenty-first minute, he caught a wink from Gyas Cutus, and with a knowing crook of the elbow, turned off his glass of what Millard called champagne and became a reprobate again. After dinner, Peter Skerrett was besieged by speculators for information. “Who are your friends?” was the cry of many a hopeful mother. Peter forgot his previous story and now asserted that they were Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar, the Three Kings of Cologne. Peter was fond of mystification. But the hotel books and the Budlongs gave more authentic accounts. Henceforth patrols of marriageable daughters were about Ira’s path; but we shall regard them no more than did he. De Châteaunéant, swaggering up the hall before dinner, had seen Sir Comeguys. He seemed to recognise and desire to avoid him, and had kept out of the way carefully. Miss Arabella was therefore solitary, as old Bud adhered to his wife, which, perhaps, accounted for the fact that she was not blossoming so luxuriantly as usual. “Miss Arabella is not a bad girl,” remarked Peter Skerrett to Waddy at dinner. “The mother--such a mother!--is ruining her, as she has already spoiled poor Tim. I abhor that woman.” Peter was usually very cool and non-committal, but he grew quite excited at this moment. “Look now at her _étalage_,” he continued, referring to her low-neck. “What fun it is--a watering-place! I’m so romantic that I have to come here every year for a week to be taken down. I should positively be falling in love with women if I didn’t see them here occasionally.” “Why not stay away and be romantic near cottages rose-embowered?” suggested Waddy. “The damsels who trim the roses are fresh as they are pure--what these others are doesn’t in the least matter.” “Gammon! Pardon me,” said Peter quickly. “That observation was addressed to the waiter--ham, I meant. Can a man like myself seek his love among hollyhocks and marigolds? Really, whatever I may say, I’m not quite spoony enough for female society, except when the band is playing melting strains of passionate despair from some Italian opera, and I am far enough distant therefrom not to observe false notes and brassiness.”