‘My name?’ says she, taking up the meaning he had not meant. ‘Do you really think it pretty? The boys and Betty despise it.’ Her gentle dignity goes home to all. Crosby is indignant with Lennox, and, indeed, so is Sir William. Sir William’s wife, however, I regret to say, is convulsed with laughter. ‘It is certainly not a name to be despised,’ says Lennox courteously, who is now a little ashamed of himself. ‘I like to be called by my Christian name,’ says a singularly young-looking married woman. ‘Puts people out so. They never know whether you are married or not for the first half-hour, at all events.’ They are now in a body strolling into the drawing-rooms, and Miss Forbes has gone back to her cross-examination of Susan. ‘Four brothers? So many? And all grown up?’ ‘Oh no! Carew is the eldest, and he is only seventeen. But we have a cousin living with us, and he is twenty.’ ‘What lovely ages!’ cries Lady Forster. ‘George, why didn’t you tell me about Susan’s boys? You know I adore boys. Susan, you must bring them up to-morrow. Do you hear?’ ‘They will be so glad,’ says Susan; ‘do you know’—blushing shyly and divinely—‘they were quite envious of me because I was coming here to-day.’ ‘Oh! why didn’t you bring them with you? Seventeen and twenty—the nicest ages in the world!’ ‘Certainly not the nicest,’ says Lennox, who is a born tease. ‘You, Miss Barry’—looking at Susan—‘are thirteen, aren’t you?’ ‘Oh no; much, much more than that!’ says Susan, laughing. Strangely enough, she has begun to feel quite a liking for her tormentor, divining with the wisdom of youth that his saucy sallies are filled with mischief only, and no venom. ‘I was eighteen last May.’ ‘How very candid!’ says Miss Prior, whose own age is growing uncertain, and who is feeling a little bitter over the attention paid to Susan. If Paul should prove inconstant, there is always the master of the Park to fall back upon, or so she has fondly hoped till now. But there is no denying the fact that Crosby has been very anxious all this afternoon about Susan’s happiness. ‘Nonsense!’ says Lennox. ‘Tell that to—well, to somebody else.’ ‘But that’s what I am really,’ says Susan, who is secretly disgusted at being thought thirteen. ‘I was born in—’ ‘Don’t tell that,’ says Lady Forster, putting up her finger. ‘It will be fatal twenty years hence.’ ‘Still, I’m not thirteen,’ says Susan, with gentle protest. ‘And I think anyone could see that I’m not.’ ‘I could, certainly,’ says Crosby, coming to the rescue. ‘In my opinion, anyone that looked at you would know at once that you were forty.’ At this they laugh, and Susan casts her so very unusual ire behind her.