"Now, dearest girl," Barbara pleaded, "_Please_ don't get excited over nothing. Jim's been in London nearly a year; in fact, he's settled there. He's associated with one of the biggest consulting surgeons we have, old Sir Peveril McCann. They met in Berlin. I didn't know it until this spring--March it was. We'd just come up from the country to meet Francis, home on a year's leave; it was just before Malcolm arrived. Somebody spoke of this Doctor Studdiford, and I said at once that it must be my foster brother. I explained as well as I could that since Francis and I had been travelling so much, Jim and I had fallen out of touch, and so on." "Who told you about him?" Julia asked. "A Mrs. Chancellor. She's quite a character," Barbara said. "Some people like her; some don't. I don't--much. She's rich, and a widow; she studies art, and she loves to get hold of interesting people." Julia winced at the vision of a plump, forty-year-old siren sending coquettish side glances at an admiring Jim. Anger stirred dully within her. "Pretty?" she asked, in as nonchalant a voice as she could command. "Ivy Chancellor? No--she's really plain," Barbara said, "a sandy, excitable little chatterbox, that's what _she_ is! She's Lady Violet Dray's daughter; Lady Violet's quite lovely. How much Jim admires Ivy I can't say; she took him about with her everywhere; he was always at the house." This was too much. Julia felt the friendly earth sway under her, a dry salty taste was in her mouth, a very hurricane of resentment shook her heart. "Oh, Barbara, do you see how he _can_?" she asked, in a stricken voice. "No, I don't!" Barbara answered, with a concerned glance at Julia's white face. "Well, as I know him, I can't believe it's the same Jim!" "I wish you had seen him," Julia said, after an interval of thought. Barbara said nothing for a few moments, then she confessed suddenly: "I _did_ see him, Julie." "You did? Oh, Bab, and you never told me all this time!" "Well, Mother and Aunt Sanna begged me not to, Ju, and Francis was most emphatic about it," Barbara pleaded. "Aunt Sanna--and Francis! But--" Julia's keen eyes read Barbara's face like an open page. "Then there was more to it!" she declared. "For they couldn't have minded my knowing just this!"