She was often heard to say that Clive was a Rock, and Clive, who knew that he was no Rock but a man like other men, and hated the knowledge, found this faith in him a comfort and a stay. So when Betty told Jim Kane that if there was the least hint of thunder in the air she simply couldn't sleep a wink and demanded inevitably: "Can I, Clive?" he smiled placidly and replied with perfect good humour: "No, rather not!" Other men, thought Miss Allison, would have brained the silly wench.

Between Betty Pemble and her mother the last member of the party was seated, taking a polite interest in an anecdote about Betty's children. Knowing his attention to be fully engaged, Miss Allison allowed herself to steal a look at Mr. James Kane's admirable profile.

The Kane family tree was a spreading one, and while Silas was the last representative of the senior line, Jim was the last of the junior. Nor could any two people have been more dissimilar.

The original founder of the family's fortune had left four sons. From the eldest son's marriage to Emily Fricker had sprung Silas. Clement was the grandson of the second. The third, emigrating to Australia, had drifted out of the Kane circle, his only surviving descendant being a granddaughter, of whose existence the English Kanes were no more than vaguely aware. The fourth son had left one daughter, who died a spinster, and one son, who was killed in Gallipoli. To this son and his wife Norma had been born Jim, the last of the Kanes.

The last of the Kanes bore very little resemblance to the rest of the family and was not a member of the firm of Kane and Mansell. He was a large fair young man with a frank smile and a pair of direct grey eyes which had a habit of gazing in Miss Allison's direction.

He worked at the Treasury, and although this was a very respectable occupation his cousins Silas and Clement could never feel that he was a really serious or responsible person.