“She is at home again. She was going to write you, but when I suggested seeing you instead, she jumped at the idea. She said it was because she detests letter writing, but I think she wanted closer communication with you, to get my report of you. I came on with Paul, Paul Randolph. He is going to marry Miss Lucas--but she said that she had told you,” Mr. Lancaster checked himself. “She did. I hoped--I mean I thought perhaps--Well, he is lucky, that’s certain. I’d be glad to have him marry Jeanette if I were his friend,” Cis stammered, confused. Anselm Lancaster elevated his eyebrows with a quizzical look. He quite well knew what Cis would have said if she had gone on with the beginning of her sentence. But all that he said was: “I suspect it is one of your secret employments to provide for your friends’ happiness! And aren’t you glad that these two are engaged, being a friend of Miss Lucas? Indeed you well may be; Paul Randolph is a fine fellow!” “Oh, I know he is! I admired him last summer, but Jeanette is fit for the best, and I’m glad, surely! She’s perfectly happy. Mr. Lancaster, I’ve got to see to the boys! Do you mind? I’d far rather not, but see that pair over there? That tussle is getting too earnest.” Cis pointed to wrestling that was rapidly degenerating into a fight. “I’ve done a meddlesome thing. I want to tell the lads about it before I tell you, because then you can’t betray how angry you are with me! But first may I show that pair--the others will not stand off long!--a trick or two of Japanese wrestling? Don’t be afraid; I’ll show them how to use it properly. They won’t come to harm, and boys have to scrap; kittens and puppies do, too, you know!” Anselm Lancaster began to take off his coat as he spoke, not waiting for Cicely’s assent to his proposal. She looked at him wondering. Was this the man whom she had feared, even when she felt most at home with him and admired him? His nearly forty years had been thrown off as he was throwing off his coat; he was like one of the older boys among her guests, except that his body showed the fine lines of breeding and training as he faced the lads, the wind blowing his silken shirt and rumpling his brown hair. “Come on, boys!” he said tightening his belt and settling the loose collar of his shirt. “I know a thing or two about the way the Japs wrestle. Stand up to me, you biggest boy over there, and I’ll give you some points which you’ll find good to know, if ever you’re in a tight place. I’ll teach the whole crowd, but you come on first. And in case the lady in whose charge we’re all here, she-that-must-be-obeyed, is afraid we’ll be too late getting home, I’ll tell you that we aren’t going to walk it. I ordered a truck to come after us at six; it will hold us all, and get us back to town in fifteen minutes; less! How does it strike you?” It struck them into silence for the space of a breath, and then into a babel of noisy approval.