“What, is Robbie here?” he asked, thereby conveying to me that he was an Oriolist. “I didn’t see him. If Robbie is in a room it’s not easy to miss him. I didn’t even know he was in town.” “Of course he is,” said Agnes. “Fancy not knowing if Robbie is in town. You might as well not know----” “If the sun is shining,” said I fervently. “Quite. Lord Marrible, do go back and see if he isn’t there. He and Mr. Goodenough and I are going back to his flat, and he is going to read to us. And then he is going to play the piano and then I suppose it will be time for breakfast before we have talked enough.” Mrs. Withers rose like a great salmon fresh from the sea, and rushed at this wonderful lure. “I never heard anything so improper,” she said. “You and--and Mr. Goodenough and Robbie Oriole! My dear Miss Lockett, who is chaperoning you?” Agnes’s face dimpled into the most delicious smile. “Ah, we don’t want any chaperon in the sunlight,” she said, as John shouldered his way back into the music-room. “Then let me drop you all at his flat,” said Mrs. Withers. “I have my motor here, and I’m going home now. I am sure it is not out of my way.” Agnes nudged me with her elbow to indicate that I had to answer this. “Robbie’s car is here, many thanks,” I said. “It’s waiting for us. I saw it when I came in.” “And he plays the piano too?” asked Mrs. Withers. Agnes laughed. “Ah, I believe you know him all the time,” she said, “and mean to repeat to him all the nice things that we say about him. You know him intimately, I believe, but if you tell me that he has already sent you those three sonnets he wrote as he flew to Cologne the other day, which he promised to read us to-night, I don’t think I could bear it. Mr. Goodenough and I were promised the first hearing of them, and I believe he has sent them to you already.” “Indeed he hasn’t,” said Mrs. Withers in a social agony. “I really don’t know Mr. Oriole, though I am dying to. I hoped you would have brought him to my little party last Thursday.” “Thursday, Thursday,” said Agnes. “Yes, I remember: Robbie was up in the Lakes. Such a pity! He would have loved it, just the sort of party he adores.” Mrs. Withers’s brow, that Greek brow with a fillet of crimson velvet across it, from which depended a splendid pearl, grew slightly corrugated, and made the pearl tremble. She prided herself on knowing all her engagements for a week ahead, but the recollection of them was difficult even to her. “Sunday at lunch then,” she said. “Will you both come and bring Mr. Oriole? Tell him how divine it would be if he would read us the Cologne sonnets.” “I’ll tell Robbie,” said Agnes, “but as for your chance of finding him disengaged, I couldn’t promise anything. How his friends grab him when he appears! Ah, there’s John--I mean Lord Marrible. Well?” “He simply isn’t here.” Agnes turned to me.