He found himself standing quite still, with his hands deep in his overcoat pockets, watching her. Her costume, too, pleased his fastidious taste. Of course a first-class tailor had cut a coat and skirt with a fit and hang like that; and the small hat, if it had nothing Parisian about it, anyhow suited the wearer and dress to perfection. He noted with quiet pleasure that she showed no signs of embarrassment when she met his watching gaze, merely crossing the road with the same jaunty, upright walk, and a gleam of fun in her eyes. “Hullo!” was her greeting. “Hope I haven’t kept you waiting. I’ve had a busy afternoon helping my chief to give you and The Right Honourable Hayes Matheson a good slanging.” “Oh, you have, have you?” The grey eyes were growing more and more approving, as he noted each detail most likely to appeal to a man who had made a study of women for many years. The shapely little ears with the glossy hair curling round them, the full, rounded throat, the determined little chin, the frank, fearless eyes. He still hardly knew whether she was pretty or not, but he discerned wery quickly that she was amply blessed with that rare gift of personality and humour that is so much more durable than a pretty face. Hal, for her part, was no less interested in him, but she found little else than that she had already seen: humorous, quizzical grey eyes, a face a good deal lined, and a mouth and chin suggesting a nature fond of enjoyment and self-indulgence, which it had never seen any cause to deny itself. She saw that he was very grey about the temples, and a trifle inclined to stoutness, but tall enough and broad enough to carry it off. A fine figure of a man, though one, she felt instinctively, belonging to a very different world to hers. Because she felt his careful scrutiny, and because she wanted to assert her indifference to it, she remarked suddenly, after a moment: “Well, how do you like me by daylight?” “How do you like me?” he retorted, and laughed. She shook her head, and her eyes grew mischievous. “Old,” she said; “quite old and grey.” “Old be damned! Forty-eight is the prime of life.” She was taking her seat, and gave a low chuckle of enjoyment at having drawn him. “Ah, you may laugh now,” he said, “but I’ll soon show you forty-eight is far more attractive than twenty-eight. Where shall we go?” “I don’t mind in the least, but I should prefer to steer for tea and buns.” “Tea and buns!… how like a woman!… How can you expect to get the vote on tea and buns?” They were spinning along the Broughton Road now, heading for Putney and Richmond, and Hal felt her spirits rising momentarily with the joy of the motion and comfort and fresh air.