"You call him that?" asked Arthur, with a shrug. Ida looked at him indignantly, evidently with a conscience ill at ease. "I shall never speak to you again," she said in an offended tone. "Not if I get your father to let Maunders come to the ball?" "Oh, can you; can you?" she asked, in a girlish, delighted tone on this occasion. "I wish you would. Father likes you so much. And you can tell him," she added handsomely, "that if he will let me ask Conny I shall invite Colonel Towton. There--that's fair." "You are playing with fire," warned Frances gravely. "Better not invite Mr. Maunders. You can never marry him." "It's indelicate to speak of my marriage in the presence of a stranger," said Ida with some heat. "I am not a stranger, I hope," remarked Vernon quickly. "Yes, you are, when you are horrid," and with a rosy face of sheer annoyance she flitted to the end of the verandah. Ida was rather like Titania, being sylph-like, golden-haired, and blue-eyed, whereas Miss Hest resembled Judith with her strongly-marked handsome face and black eyebrows. "Who is horrid?" asked a voice at this juncture, and Mr. Dimsdale appeared on the threshold of the French window, which was behind the table. "Ah, Arthur, is that you? I have been expecting to see you. Come into the library." Vernon obeyed at once, as Frances had hurried after the petulant girl to pacify her. Miss Hest treated Ida as a wilful child, and by scolding and coaxing and cajoling managed to get her to behave like a reasonable being. It must be confessed that Dimsdale had spoiled his golden-haired darling, and even the boarding-school she had attended could not supply the place of the mother, who was dead. The old man turned to Vernon when they entered the drawing-room through the French window. "Who is horrid?" he asked again. Vernon laughed and slipped into a chair. "It's a storm in a tea-cup," he explained easily, and accepting a cigar. "Miss Hest advised Ida to give up Maunders, and I supported her. Then Ida----" "I know, I know," broke in Dimsdale sadly. "She is wilful and is quite infatuated with the scamp. Arthur, Arthur, I should have married again, so that Ida could be trained by a good woman. I can't manage her." "I think Miss Hest can," said Vernon significantly; "and she has sense enough for two. A most masculine young person. But do you think you are wise forbidding Maunders to come to this masked ball?" "Yes, I do. Ida is crazy about him." "Opposition will only make her more crazy," warned Vernon, shaking his sleek head. "It would be better to let them come together, and then she would get sick of him. Maunders is so shallow that she would find him out sooner or later, for Ida has plenty of common sense if it was not obscured by this persistent frivolity, which, after all, is only a youthful fault." "But if Maunders wants to marry her----" "He doesn't, Mr. Dimsdale. I can vouch for that. He wants to marry your niece."