June frowned. "I don't like to hear you talk like that about Micky! It's not fair, when you don't know him. I tell you he's one of the best--and, anyway, as he's a friend of mine----" Esther flushed. "I'm sorry--I'd no right to have said anything about him at all; please forgive me." "Oh, it's all right," June said laconically. "But he isn't a bit of a snob; he'd do anything in the world for anybody." Esther glanced up at his portrait on the shelf. She felt a trifle ashamed of what she had said; after all, Micky had been good to her in his own way, even if his own way had been patronising. "And so I shall stay on here," she said, after a moment. "And if you think you would still like me to share this room----" June pounced upon her. "You darling! It's too good to be true. Of course, I should love it! I'll go and tell old Mother Elders straight away; it will put her in a good temper for a month." "She's out," Esther said quickly. "I went to tell her myself as soon as I got my letter.... It only came this morning." She coloured sensitively beneath June's quizzical eyes. "And of course you've been devouring it ever since," June said. "Well, and very nice too! There's nothing to be ashamed of. I'll admit that I didn't think somehow that he could be a very nice sort of person, this young man of yours. No, I don't know why I thought so--just an idea of mine. I get hold of ideas like that. But I've changed my mind now; I'm sure he's a dear, or you'd never look so happy." "I should love you to see him," Esther said with enthusiasm. "I'm sure you would like him. I don't know his people, of course--I suppose if they thought he cared for me they'd be angry--but it doesn't really matter, and I know he doesn't care at all for his mother...." June looked up from stroking Charlie. "Now, I wish you hadn't said that," she said frankly. "No man can be really nice who doesn't love his own mother." Esther looked distressed. "But she's horrid!" she said eagerly. "He has told me how horrid she is to him--really she is--and as he's her only son----" She stopped. "After all," she went on, "there's no law to make you like a woman just because you happen to be her son, is there?" "It's unnatural not to," June answered shortly. "However, as neither of us know his mother, we'll give him the benefit of the doubt. She may be a perfect old cat. Some women are." She wandered round the room to find a cigarette, and Esther sat looking into the fire. She could not remember her own mother. But somehow she felt sure that, had she been living, she would have adored her. She had never heard Raymond say anything nice of Mrs. Ashton--he had always spoken about her in a bitter, half sneering way. She looked across to June timidly. "Do you always judge people by what you call 'instinct'?" she asked. "When I first knew you you told me that you felt sure you would like me before ever you saw me, and----"