He brought the man forward; he looked about the same age as Guy himself, and Amber expressed to his face something of the delight which she felt to meet him. He was not quite so fluent when he opened his lips: as a matter of fact he seemed to be shy almost to a point of embarrassment, and to find that the act of changing his stick from one hand to the other and then treating it as a pendulum not only failed to relieve his embarrassment, but was actually a source of embarrassment to people on each side of him. Amber wondered if it might not be possible for her to add this young man to her already long list of those whom she was influencing for their own good, through the medium of a colourless friendship. CHAPTER X I am so glad to meet you, Mr. Winwood,” she said. “Mr. Overton mentioned that he thought your father was acquainted with mine long ago.” “I was under that impression--in fact, I am nearly sure--however----” Amber gave him a chance of finishing his sentence; but he did not take advantage of her offer. “You think that it is possible he may have made a mistake?” she said. He did not answer immediately. He followed with his eyes the irritating sweep of his Malacca cane. “I should like you to ask Sir Creighton if he has any recollection of my father before I make any further claims,” he said, suddenly looking at her straight in the face. “I have already done so,” said Amber. He was so startled that he coloured beneath the brown surface of his skin. The effect was a picturesque one. “And he said that he remembered--that----” “He said that we should ask you to dinner.” “Then that’s all right,” put in Guy Overton, for he could not but notice the expression of disappointment on the face of the Australian. And when he noticed that expression, of course Amber noticed it. “We hope that you will come and dine with us, Mr. Winwood,” she said. “That is how things begin--and end, in England, I think,” cried Winwood with a laugh that had a note of contempt in its ring. “A dinner is supposed to do duty for welcome as well as for _congé_. I am always wondering which of the two every invitation that I get is meant to be--a welcome or the other. I knew a man who used to say that an invitation to dinner in England is the height of inhospitality.” “I say, that’s a bit of freehand drawing, isn’t it?” said Guy. “You seem to have left your manners in the unclaimed luggage department, Winwood. Besides--well, I give a little dinner to my friends now and again--yes, in the Frangipanni: the only place where you get the real macaroni in London. Their Chianti is really not half bad, when you get----” “I understand exactly what Mr. Winwood means, and I quite agree with him: a dinner is the most cordial form of inhospitality,” said Amber. “But if----” “I really must ask your pardon, Miss Severn,” interposed Winwood. “I did not mean quite that----” “You meant that you gathered from what I said that my father had no recollection of yours.”