“Any reason why she shouldn’t?”

A bright colour came up under Cicely’s brown skin.

“As if you didn’t know! He makes love to every girl he meets, and if Georgina married him she would have to look after him for the rest of her life-and she’s not that sort, you know.”

“What sort is she?”

Cicely’s expression changed. Her really lovely sherry-coloured eyes looked up at him.

“She is-” She hesitated for a word, and then said, “vulnerable. Most people wouldn’t tell you that. They would say that she had looks and-and everything she wanted. But they don’t know. She doesn’t know either. She thinks everyone is like herself. She-she-oh, well she wouldn’t know a snake if she saw one.”

“You’re being harsh, aren’t you? Is Johnny Fabian the snake?”

Cicely’s chin lifted.

“Oh, I don’t know-he might be.”

She bit her lip, and her colour went out like a blown flame. He had an impression that if she hadn’t been dancing she might have stamped her foot. As it was, she jerked against his arm and came out with a burst of words.

“The trouble is she’ll have a great deal too much money!”

Cicely herself had had too much money. [*see Eternity Ring]. Lady Evelyn Abbott’s considerable fortune had gone past her father and Frank to the fifteen-year-old grand-daughter who was the only relation with whom she had not contrived to quarrel, and the first year of Cicely’s marriage had nearly come to grief upon the prejudices and suspicions which her grandmother’s twisted mind had implanted. The memory of those miserable months was in her voice as she spoke.

Frank gave her a light answer.

“Most people could put up with that complaint.” And then, as she looked up at him again startled, “Don’t make too much of it, Cis. Johnny wouldn’t anyway.”