"Now I am going to put a piece of scarlet geranium in your buttonhole, and I am going to take you out into the garden and hand you over to my brother, and tell him that my task is done, that you are my slave, and that he has only to speak and you will go out into the world with a revolver in one hand and a sword in the other, and wear any uniform or fight in any cause he chooses. Come!" "You know," Arnold said, as they left the room, "I don't know any man I admire so much as your brother, but I am almost as frightened of him as I am of you." "One who talks of fear so glibly," she answered, "seldom knows anything about it." "There are as many different sorts of fear as there are different sorts of courage," he remarked. "How we are improving!" she murmured. "We shall begin moralizing soon. Presently I really think we shall compare notes about the books we have read and the theatres we have been to, and before we are gray-headed I think one of us will allude to the weather. Now isn't my brother a wonderful man? Look at that flush upon Miss Lalonde's cheeks. Aren't you jealous?" "Miserably!" Sabatini rose to his feet and greeted his sister after his own fashion, holding both her hands and kissing her on both cheeks. "If only," he sighed, "our family had possessed morals equal to their looks, what a race we should have been! But, my dear sister,--a question of taste only,--you should leave Doucet and Paquin at home when you come to my bungalow." "You men never altogether understand," she replied. "Nothing requires a little artificial aid so much as nature. It is the piquancy of the contrast, you see. That is why the decorations of Watteau are the most wonderful in the world. He knew how to combine the purely, exquisitely artificial with the entirely simple. Now to break the news to Miss Lalonde!" Ruth turned a smiling face towards her. "It is to say that our fete day is at an end," she said, looking for her stick. "Fete days do not end at six o'clock in the afternoon," Fenella replied. "I want you to be very kind and give us all a great deal of pleasure. We want to make a little party--you and Mr. Chetwode, my brother, myself and Mr. Weatherley--and dine under that cedar tree, just as we are. We are going to call it supper. Then, afterwards, you will have a ride back to London in the cool air. Either my brother will take you, or we will send a car from here." "It is a charming idea," Sabatini said. "Miss Lalonde, you will not be unkind?" She hesitated only for a moment. They saw her glance at her frock, the little feminine struggle, and the woman's conquest. "If you really mean it," she said, "why, of course, I should love it. It is no good my pretending that if I had known I should have been better prepared," she continued, "because it really wouldn't have made any difference. If you don't mind--"