The subject remained closed for the rest of the Weymouth visit. Mother and daughter returned to London a month later. James was at work downstairs. When Posy and he met, she could hardly believe that he was the same James who had sat beside her on the pier. His dignified salutation, "Good-afternoon, Miss Quinney!" seemed ludicrously inadequate, but what else could the poor fellow have said? Posy could find no answer to this insistent question, and yet she had expected a different greeting. He had not offered to shake hands, nor had she. Ought she to have held out her hand first? Was he offended because she hadn’t? When she woke next morning she wondered whether James was wishing that he had died in the night. The determination to brighten his life, within reasonable limits, imposed itself upon her while she was dressing. More, it inspired her to choose a clean, lilac-coloured frock, which became her admirably. Putting up her hair she was careful to arrange it artistically, because an artist might look at it with deep-set, melancholy eyes. If you had told her that she was romantic she would have been furious. At breakfast Quinney said briskly: "I’ve a job for you, my girl." "Certainly, daddy." "I’m going to turn over to you the dusting of my china, and the cleaning of the Waterford glass. You used to do it nicely before you went to boarding-school." "I shall just love it." Quinney was much gratified. Posy, he reflected, was his own dear daughter; no nonsense about her, no highfalutin airs and graces, first and last a perfect lady. He smacked his lips with satisfaction. "You must teach me values, daddy." "By Gum, I will. You’ll learn, too, mighty quick. Did the girls at your school ever throw it up to you that you was a tradesman’s daughter?" "No, I told them that you were the honestest dealer in England." "So I am, my pretty, the honestest in the world. It pays to be honest." "That’s not why you’re honest?" "No, missie, it ain’t. I swore solemn never to sell fakes except as such the night you was born." "What a funny time to choose!" Susan made a sign to him, but he went on: "Funny? Never could make out why people use that word in such a silly way. Funny? Your dear mother nearly died the night you came to us." Susan interfered nervously. "Now, Joe, you ain’t going into that, are you?" "Yes, I am. Why not? It’s high time, speakin’ of values, that young Posy should know just what she cost us. I say it’s part of her education, the part she couldn’t learn at school. She’s eighteen. She knows, I take it, that she didn’t drop from heaven into the middle of a gooseberry bush?" At this Susan, not Posy, blushed. It was the girl who said, calmly: "You are quite right, father. I ought to know what I’ve cost both of you." She looked at her mother tenderly, and spoke in a softer voice: "Is it true that you nearly died?" "Yes." "And so did I," said Quinney. Posy’s eyes filled with tears.