Gradually Sylvia did succeed in sorting out from the various men a few who were content to accept the terms of friendship she offered. She had to admit that most of them fell soon or late, and with each new man she gave less and took more. As regards Lily, she tried to keep her as unapproachable as herself, but it was not always possible. Sometimes with a shrug of the shoulders she let Lily go her own way, though she was always hard as steel with the fortunate suitor. Once a rich young financier called Hausberg, who had found Lily somewhat expensive, started a theory that Sylvia was living on her friend; she heard of the slander and dealt with it very directly. The young man in question was anxious to set Lily up in a flat of her own. Sylvia let Lily appear to view the plan with favor. The flat was taken and furnished; a date was fixed for Lily's entrance; the young man was given the latch-key and told to come at midnight. When he arrived, there was nobody in the flat but a chimpanzee that Sylvia had bought at Jamrack's. She and Lily were at Brighton with Arthur Lonsdale and Tony Clarehaven, whom they had recently met again at a Covent Garden ball. They were both just down from Oxford, and Lonsdale had taken a great fancy to Lily. He was a jolly youth, whose father, Lord Cleveden, had consented after a struggle to let him go into partnership with a distinguished professional motorist. It was with him that Dorothy Lonsdale claimed distant kinship. Clarehaven's admiration for Dorothy had not diminished; somebody had told him that the best way to get hold of her would be to make her jealous. This was his object in inviting Sylvia to Brighton. Sylvia agreed to go, partly to tease Dorothy, partly to disappoint Clarehaven. Lonsdale had helped her to get the chimpanzee into the flat, and all the way down to Brighton they laughed. "My word, you know!" Lonsdale chuckled, "the jolly old chimpanzee will probably eat the wall-paper. What do you think Hausberg will say when he opens the door?" "I expect he'll say, 'Are you there, Lily?'" Sylvia suggested.