"It was very kind of you," she replied, "but I am afraid I can't manage it to-day. I have promised to go out to tea with some friends of Doctor Gray's." She paused for a moment, and then glanced hesitatingly from one to the other of them. "Let me introduce you," she added. "Doctor Gray--Major Fenton." The two men nodded to each other. "It will do you much more good to come for a spin," persisted the new arrival. "Besides, I understood that we more or less fixed it up last Thursday." "Did we?" said Nancy coolly. "I don't remember actually mentioning the day." "Well, I understood so anyhow," returned the other. He leaned across and opened the door. "Come along," he added persuasively. "I am sure Doctor Gray will excuse you." "I have no doubt he would," said Nancy, "but, as it happens, I particularly want to meet his friends." She held out a small gloved hand, which the other accepted with obvious reluctance. "You must really excuse me, Major Fenton," she continued. "I can't possibly manage to come to-day though I am very much obliged to you for offering to take me." Except for an ugly glint in his blue eyes, the owner of the car managed to control his emotions. "Oh, very well," he said, with a rather forced laugh, "if you're really booked up, of course that settles it. We must make it another day instead, eh? How about to-morrow?" "To-morrow would be all right," said Nancy, "as far as I know at present." "I'll call for you at the same time, then--say three o'clock, or perhaps we'd better make it a quarter past." He lifted his hat again, and, after bestowing a curt nod on Colin, leaned over and closed the door of the car. The next moment he was moving away rapidly up the street. Nancy gave a sigh of relief. "I'm glad you were with me," she said, as they started off in the opposite direction. "If I had been alone I couldn't very well have got out of it." Colin looked at her in surprise. "Why on earth should you go if you don't want to?" he asked. "Is that truculent warrior your guardian or what?" Nancy shook her head. "I don't know anything about him," she answered, "except that he happens to be an old friend of my father's." She paused for an instant as they turned the corner into King's Road. "You see, I am rather alone in the world," she continued. "My father and mother both died when I was a baby, and as Major Fenton took the trouble to come and hunt me out about two months ago I didn't like to seem ungrateful." There was a touch of wistfulness in her voice which went straight to Colin's heart. "Of course, that's different," he said gently. "It's rotten bad luck to be left all by oneself. Haven't you any relations or people of that sort?"