Mollie laughed and shrugged her shoulders again, and then looked up at her small inquisitor charmingly defiant. “It was--Mr. Chandos!” she confessed. Aimée gazed at her for a moment in blank amazement. “But,” she objected, “you don't know him any more than I do. You have only seen him once through the window, and you have never been introduced to him.” “I have seen him twice,” said Mollie. “Don't you recollect my telling you that he picked up my glove for me the night I carried Dolly's dress to Bra-bazon Lodge, and,” faltering a little and dropping her eyes, “he introduced himself to me. He met me in town. I was passing through the Arcade, and he stopped to ask about Phil. He apologized, of course, you know, for doing it, but he said he was very anxious to know when Phil would be at home, and--and perhaps I would be so kind as to tell him. He wants to see him about a picture. And--then, you know, somehow or other, he said something else, and--and I answered him--and he walked to the gate with me.” “He took a great liberty,” said Aimée. “And it was very imprudent in you to let him come. I don't know what you could be thinking of. The idea of picking up people in the street like that, Mollie; you must be crazy.” “I could n't help it,” returned Mollie, not appearing at all disturbed. “He knows Phil and he knows Dolly--a little. And he is very nice. He wants to know us all. And he says Mr. Gowan is one of his best friends. I liked him myself.” “I dare say you did,” despairingly. “You are such a child. You would like the man in the moon or a Kaffre chief--” “That is not true,” interposed the delinquent. “I don't know about the man in the moon. He might be well enough--at any rate, he would be travelled and a novelty, but Kaffre chiefs are odious. Don't you remember those we saw last winter?” “Mollie,” said Aimée, “you are only jesting because you are ashamed of yourself. You _know_ you were wrong to let that man come home with you.” Then Mollie hung her head and made a lovely rebellious move. “I don't care,” she said; “if it was n't exactly correct, it was nice. But that is always the way,” indignantly, “nice things are always improper.” Here was a defection for you. The oracle quite shuddered in her discreet disapproval. “If you go on in that way,” she said, “you will be ending by saying that improper things are always nice.” “Never mind how I end,” observed the prisoner at the bar. “You have ended by wakening Tod;” which remark terminated the conversation somewhat abruptly.