"Now don't begin to quarrel, girls," said Mrs. Guthrie. "I'm very sorry Ethel wasn't with us. The trip would have widened her view and given her much to think about. But never mind. She shall go with us next time." Ethel stifled a yawn. "Thank you, mamma, dear. But when I go to England I may elect to stay there. I think it's very probable that I shall marry an Englishman and settle down to country life, doing London in the season." Belle's laugh rang out. "That's the sort of thing we have to put up with, Betty," she said. "You're going to marry a Duke, aren't you, Baby, and be a Lady in Waiting at Court, with a full-page photograph every week in the _Tatler_? When Peter comes home he'll find you a constant source of joy. My descriptions of the way in which you've come on while he's been away always made him laugh." Ethel rose languidly from the sofa, at the side of which a little nourishment had been served. Mrs. Guthrie, who had been busily at work knitting a scarf for Graham--a thing that he would certainly never wear--went quickly to give her a hand. "Are you going to your room now, darling?" she asked. Ethel caught Belle's rather sceptical eye and, with exquisite coolness, entirely ignored its suggestion that she was shamming. "Yes, mamma, dear. I shall go to bed almost at once. There's nothing like sleep for anæmia. Of course I shall have to read for a little while, because insomnia goes with my complaint, but I shall fall off as soon as I can. Please don't come in to-night, in case you disturb me. I'll tell Ellen to put my hot milk in a thermos." Belle burst into another laugh. "You beat the band," she said. "Any one would think that your school was for the daughters of royalty. I know exactly what Nicholas Kenyon will call you." Ethel turned towards her sister with raised eyebrows. With her rather retroussé nose, fine, wide-apart eyes and soft round chin she looked very pretty and amazingly self-composed. Her poise was that of a woman who had been a leader of society for years. "Yes? And what will that be?" "The queen of the Flappers," said Belle. Ethel picked up her book, carefully placing the marker. "Oxford slang leaves me cold," she said, loftily. "I certainly hope that he'll call her nothing of the sort," said Mrs. Guthrie. "'Flapper.' What a terrible word! What does it mean?" "It means girls under seventeen who have discovered all the secrets of life, the value of a pair of pretty ankles and exactly how to get everybody else to do things for them. It's the best word I heard in England." "Nicholas Kenyon sounds to me rather a precocious boy," said Ethel. "Boy! Nicholas Kenyon a boy--! Well!" Belle acknowledged herself beaten. She could find no other words. The little mother put her arm, with great affection, around the shoulders of her youngest child, of whom she was extremely proud and a little frightened. "Never mind, darling," she said. "Belle doesn't mean anything. It's only her fun."