Dinner was considerably delayed, owing to the fact that the Miss Herveys were late, and Georgia had some time in which to try her skill upon Dick. Her task was more difficult than she had anticipated, for he manifested an abiding resentment which irritated her as being quite out of proportion to the circumstances which had called it forth, and he answered her only in frigid monosyllables. Georgia talked on bravely, resolved not to appear to notice his lack of responsiveness, although she could not but feel slightly aggrieved by her failure to soften him. When Sir Dugald Haigh crossed the room to speak to Dick, and, with an apology to Georgia, carried him off to be introduced to Lady Haigh, she heaved a little sigh. “He was such a nice boy!” she said to herself, “and I think he would be nice now, if he would only let his better side show. I like his face so much.” She glanced across the room at him, and marked appreciatively the thin brown face, on which the fair moustache looked almost white, the firm chin, the keen grey eyes, and the brow set in the habitual frown produced by the constant watching of distant objects under a burning sun. “He looks like a ‘man and a leader of men,’” she went on slowly, “but why should he behave in this way? It is so small, so petty, to keep up a grudge for so many years, and how could I have done anything but refuse him? It would have been absurd to do anything else, even if I had cared for him, and he was such a boy. He must be at least two years older than I am, but I always felt then that he was years younger. At any rate, he ought to be grateful to me, instead of sulking like this.” At this moment a diversion was created by the entrance of the beautiful Miss Hervey, a vision of loveliness in rose-coloured silk; while behind her came her sister, a smaller, plainer, and, so to speak more shadowy, edition of herself. Mabel gave Georgia a look which implied that the young lady was by no means averse to making herself the observed of all observers in this fashion, but if such was the case, her triumph was short, for every one resented the delay which had been caused by her non-appearance. The host marched up Dr Headlam and presented him to Miss Hervey, to the intense disgust of Fitz Anstruther, Mrs Egerton’s brother, who found himself put off with the younger sister instead of the lady he adored, and a move was made into the dining-room.