"I shouldn't want him softened, myself. He'd be sillier than ever. Tell me all about it, Joan. How did he behave?" Joan told her all about it; and the recital would not have pleased Mr. Robert Trench, if he had heard it. With those cool young eyes she had remorselessly regarded the antics of the attracted male, and found them only absurd. But she had not put a stop to them. "You know, Nancy," she said guilelessly, "it's all very well to talk as they do in books about a man being able to make a girl like him if he keeps at her long enough; but I am quite sure Bobby Trench could never make me like him--in that way--if he tried for a hundred years. Still, it _is_ rather nice to feel that one is grown up at last." "The fact of the matter is, you have been flirting with Bobby Trench," said Nancy; "and you ought to be ashamed of yourself." But Joan indignantly denied this. "What I did," she said, "was to prevent his flirting with me." There was a moment's pause. Then Nancy said unconcernedly, "I suppose I told you that John Spence came here." Joan turned round sharply, and looked at her. "No, you didn't," she said. After another moment's pause, she said, "You know you didn't." Then came the question: "Why didn't you?" "He was only here for two nights," said Nancy. "At the Dower House, of course. If I didn't tell you, I meant to." Joan scrutinised her closely, and then turned away. "He was awfully sorry to miss you," Nancy said. "He told me to give you his love." "Thank you," said Joan, rather stiffly. John Spence was a friend of Dick Clinton, who had managed his estates for him for a year. He had first come to Kencote when the twins were about fifteen, and had impressed himself on their youthful imaginations. He was nearly twenty years older than they, but simple of mind, free of his laughter, and noticeably warm-hearted. He liked all young things; and the Clinton twins had afforded him great amusement. He had been to Kencote occasionally as they were growing up, and the elder-brotherly intimacy with which he had treated them at the first had not altered. He was the friend of both of them, but when he had come twice to Kencote to shoot, during the previous season, he had seemed to show a very slight preference for the society of Joan. It had been so slight that the twins, who had never had thoughts which they had not shared, had made no mention of it between them.