'No, but----' She turned her laughing face to him. 'When is something else going to begin, Tommy? I'm all ready for adventures. I've spent all my money----' 'You've spent----?' 'Now don't pretend to be surprised--it's all gone in frocks, and presents, and things. But---- Why, you never asked me where I got my necklace!' 'If you wore the Koh-i-Noor should I ask you where you got it?' 'Airey sent it to me to-day. I refused it from him before, but to-day I'm going to keep it. Because of what it means to him, you know.' She pushed her cloak a little aside and fingered the pearls. 'Yes, the money's all gone,' she went on, rather pleased apparently; 'and there's no more from poor dear uncle, and--and Airey Newton won't live in Danes Inn any longer!' Tommy was silent; he was not silent altogether without an effort, but silent he was. She pressed his arm for a moment. 'Will you be promoted to Airey Newton's place?' she asked. 'But why only tea?' said Tommy. She waited a little before she answered. 'What should you say,' she asked at last, 'if I ever changed?' She did not tell him from what: in words she had never told him, and in words he had never asked. 'I should wait for you to change back again,' said he. Was he the man that in Lady Blixworth's opinion the situation needed? Peggy was eager in her explanation, but she seemed a little puzzled too. 'I know how much it is to ask,' she said, 'and there's no bond, no promise from you. But somehow it seems to me that I must see some more. Oh, there it all is, Tommy--waiting, waiting! Trix has made me feel that more and more. Was she all wrong? I don't know. Airey was there in the end, you see. And now there are all sorts of things behind her, making--making a background to it. I don't want all she's had; but, Tommy, I want some more.' He heard her with a sober smile; if there were a touch of sadness in it, there was understanding too. They had come to her door in Harriet Street, and she stopped on the threshold. 'I sha'n't starve. You'll be there at tea-time,' said she with an appealing smile. His man's feeling was against her. It was, perhaps, too much to ask of him that he should sympathise fully with her idea; he saw its meaning, but its meaning could not be his ideal. He would have taken her now at once, when, as his thoughts put it, the bloom was fresh and she had rubbed so little against the world. The instinct in her and the longings which bore her the other way were strange to him.