“Bless you, mum, you are partial, aren’t you!”

“Oh, George, you ought to know by now that you’re my favorite son—”

“There you are, George, that’s plain enough!” The private view had taken a slightly unexpected turn, but Hilary was still an interested spectator. It was not really news to him that George was the favorite, he had known it at the back of his mind ever since their school days. But all the same, it was odd to hear her say it, so shamelessly, and to see how unsurprised George was. George had always known it too, obviously. Well, there was one thing about old George, he never pretended. It was like George to accept his mother’s tribute with a frank pleasure amounting to smugness, and even to consider it no more than his due. Doubtless George was capable also of numbering Alice among his just prerogatives. He had the fine, lusty, open-faced ego of the pampered British male.

“You may think I don’t think of these things, but I do,” his mother went on to assure George seriously. “And that’s why I know Hilary isn’t the marrying kind, and the sooner Alice finds that out the better!”

“Yes, but in the meantime—until she does find out—I can’t very well interfere, you know,” George reminded her virtuously.

“Oh, you men!” she cried in exasperation. “When will you understand that a woman wants to be won!”

“Uh—I see,” said George, and was visibly turning things over in his mind.

“Careful, mother, you’re giving him ideas,” Hilary cautioned her.

“You needn’t look so innocent, George, you weren’t born yesterday!” said his mother, and both her sons regarded her with amazement and no little respect, from their separate viewpoints. “I don’t believe Hilary cares tuppence about Alice anyway,” she remarked defiantly.

“She thinks he does,” said George. “It amounts to the same thing.”

“No—it doesn’t,” she contradicted. “Besides, she wouldn’t be happy with him. I mean—” she added quickly, and then hesitated. “—that is—I don’t think she would,” she finished lamely.

“Why?” demanded Hilary.

George was silent, fiddling with the cocktail tray in an embarrassed sort of way, for he had not been on these confidential terms with his mother for years. She went to drawing little meaningless things on a fresh sheet of note paper, taking care not to look at him, for she flattered herself that she never tried to interfere in her children’s private affairs. Hilary came nearer to her, moving soundlessly across the carpet. Indirectly, she had answered him once before. Indirectly she seemed to be aware of him, and out of this wholly subconscious contact he hoped to glean the clues he needed, and perhaps find out why he was here instead of tucked up in his cozy grave on the Frontier.