She did not answer for a moment. "Have I?" she asked. "I didn't know it; but I will. That will be nice. And you are coming to decorate to-morrow, aren't you? That will be nice, too." Her tone lingered in his ears long after she had gone. It was with him even when he was driving Mrs. Smith home, and, of course, making up their little misunderstanding by the way; possibly, because of this making up, since, for the first time, the elaborate _éclaircissement_ irked him. It seemed so unnecessary unless the whole affair meant something, which was quite out of the question. For instance, when driving Lance Carlyon back to the Fort afterwards he did not desire an explanation of the latter's moodiness. When a chum was evil-dispositioned, you waited calmly for him to come round. That was friendship. "I'm sorry Miss Shepherd couldn't come," said Lance, suddenly, his eyes on that spit of sand, with its hovels and logs, below the town. "I wanted her to, awfully, if only because she's never seen a _durbar_; but"--he smiled--"I expect someone else wanted her instead. By George! Dering, you don't know how that girl works. Sometimes I feel it's a shame, and sometimes I think it's splendid--though of course it don't matter a dash what I think." And that--Vincent Dering asked himself--was that love? Laila Bonaventura's voice came back to make him certain of one thing. That would not be her version of the old, old story; and the knowledge made him, somehow, more content with his world. Meanwhile another man in yellow and silver lace was being haunted by a girl's voice, which had spoken of things which no decent woman of his own race would have mentioned; yet which had spoken to him with an equality which no Englishwoman would have allowed herself. And as for Englishmen! The recollection of Father Narâyan's face as he carried the girl off made Roshan Khân curse under his breath. But the girl herself had been different. He literally did not know what to think; and the desire for someone else's opinion grew so strong that, finally, with a curious mixture of reluctance and triumph, he forsook the straight road to the Fort, and turned his horse's head towards his grandmother's house. She was at least a woman; she might understand and judge better than he. His first sight of her, however, in unprepared toilette, _minus_ the green satin trousers which gave such dignity to her rotund little figure, _minus_ all pretence at pomp, dirty, untidy, unkempt both in her surroundings and herself, made him feel what a fool he was. The more so when she began by resenting his summary visitation, especially in uniform, which, she asserted, made her feel, even at her age, as if she were committing the indiscretion of seeing a stranger! What could a woman like that know? Yet having come, he might as well go through with his errand; so he cut short her upbraidings by saying without preamble: "I have seen my cousin. I spoke to her, and--and she spoke back again."