It was certainly a relief to him that this was so; and yet, as he met her warm, ironical, half-mischievous glance, a glance full of a sort of gloating tenderness that laughed at both itself and its object, he felt obscurely uneasy.

“I hope,” he said at last, “that I shan’t inflict my philanthropies on Gerda. Fortunately she’s got a very sweet nature.”

A somewhat grim look passed over Mrs. Solent’s face. Her adamantine chin was pushed forward; and her underlip, like the underlip of a carnivore, protruded itself in an extremely formidable manner.

“I don’t see your pretty Gerda putting herself out for anybody,” she said.

Wolf began instantaneously to grow angry⁠—far more angry than he could himself account for.

“She’s as anxious about them as I am,” he retorted hotly.