Feather's final thrust in parting with her daughter was: "Donal Muir is a young man by this time. I wonder what his mother would do now if he turned up at your mistress' house and began to make love to you." She laughed outright. "You'll get into all sorts of messes but that would be the nicest one!" * * * * * The Duchess came to understand that Robin held it deep in her mind that she was a sort of young outcast. "If she consorted," she thought, "with other young things and shared their pleasures she would forget it." She talked the matter over with her daughter, Lady Lothwell. "I am not launching a girl in society," she said, "I only want to help her to know a few nice young people. I shall begin with your children. They are mine if I am only a grandmother. A small dinner and a small dance--and George and Kathryn may be the beginning of an interesting experiment." * * * * * The Duchess was rarely mistaken. The experiment was interesting. For George--Lord Halwyn--it held a certain element of disaster. It was he who danced with Robin first. He had heard of the girl who was a sort of sublimated companion to his grandmother. He had encountered companions before. This one, as she flew like a blown leaf across the floor and laughed up into his face with wide eyes produced a new effect and was a new kind. He led her to the conservatory. He was extremely young and his fleeting emotions had never known a tight rein. An intoxicating hot-house perfume filled his nostrils. Suddenly he let himself go and was kissing the warm velvet of her slim little neck. "You--you--you've spoiled everything in the world!" she cried. "Now"--with a desolate, horrible little sob--"now I can only go back--_back_." She spoke as if she were Cinderella and he had made the clock strike twelve. Her voice had absolute grief in it. "I say,"--he was contrite--"don't speak like that. I beg pardon. I'll grovel. Don't-- Oh, Kathryn! Come here!" This last because his sister had suddenly appeared. Kathryn bore Robin away. Boys like George didn't really matter, she pointed out, though of course it was bad manners. She had been kissed herself, it seemed. As they walked between banked flowers she added: "By the way, somebody important has been assassinated in one of the Balkan countries. Lord Coombe has just come in and is talking it over with grandmamma." As they neared the entrance to the ballroom she paused with a new kind of impish smile. "The very best looking boy in all England," she said, "is dancing with Sara Studleigh. He dropped in by chance to call and grandmamma made him stay. His name is Donal Muir. He is Lord Coombe's heir. Here he comes. Look!" He was now scarcely two yards away. Almost as if he had been called he turned his eyes toward Robin and straight into hers they laughed--straight into hers.