“How careless of me!” she said easily, quelling, with quiet self-control, her confusion ere it could well be remarked. “I don’t know what I was thinking of!--Do go on, Poppa! It was just getting interesting.” She signed composedly to a servant to pick up the broken glass, and settled herself, all attention, to the familiar story. “What a hostess she is!” thought her father. “Just like----” He did not finish the complementary clause and stifled another which began: “I wonder what I shall do when----” He picked up his story again and was rewarded by his meed of laughter. But his eyes rested uneasily on his daughter and he promised himself a later enquiry into this abnormality. The party withdrew into the drawing-room, where, since Forsdyke was a widower of many years’ masculine supremacy, the men lit their cigars. Hetty, at a request from her father, seated herself at the grand piano in the far corner, and commenced the soft chords of a Chopin prelude. Jimmy Lomax stood over her. There was already something proprietary in his air. But the girl, after one glance up at him, seemed to forget his presence in the spell of the music. Her position commanded a full view of the room and she looked dreamily across to where the three men were gathered by the white marble fireplace. Suddenly the music stopped on a crashing discord. The girl had jumped to her feet, was trembling violently. Young Lomax clutched at her. “Hetty! What----?” She broke away from him, came swiftly across the room to his father. “Professor!” she said. “You were once in practice as a doctor, weren’t you?” The twinkling eyes went grave as they met hers. There was unmistakable seriousness in her question. “Yes, my dear----” “Then I want you to examine me right here, Professor!” she said. “Tell me if I’ve got fever!” She met the amazed eyes of the other men with a look which announced that she knew her own business. Without a word the Professor lifted up her wrist and felt her pulse. “Now show me your tongue!” She obeyed. He nodded his head, and placed his hand upon her brow. His eyes plunged into hers for one second of searching scrutiny and then he nodded his head again, satisfied. “My dear,” he said, “I haven’t a thermometer here, but I should say you are absolutely normal in every way. Your pulse is a shade rapid, perhaps.” The girl took a long breath. “Thank you, Professor,” she said, simply. She turned to the others. “You heard what the Professor said? There’s no fever about _me_. Now--listen! I want to tell you something. I’ve been waiting to tell you ever since we sat down to dinner--and now I _must_ tell you! And you mustn’t laugh!--Poppa, this is serious!” The four men, puzzled at her demeanour, grouped themselves round her. She assured herself of their gravity.