‘I don’t see the justice of that at all,’ said Mrs Thorne.  ’It seems to me that a good dinner is much entitled to a morsel of pasteboard in April as at any other time.  You won’t have another till you have called—­unless you’re specially wanted.’

Crosbie would have gone on, but that in his attempt to do so he passed close by the chair on which Mrs Harold Smith was sitting, and that he was accosted by her.  ‘Mr Crosbie,’ she said, ’I haven’t seen you for an age.  Has it come to pass that you have buried yourself entirely?’ He did not know how to extricate himself so as to move on at once.  He paused, and hesitated, and then stopped, and made an attempt to talk to Mrs Smith as though he were at his ease.  The attempt was anything but successful; but having once stopped, he did not know how to put himself in motion again, so that he might escape.  At this moment Bernard Dale and Emily Dunstable came up and joined the group; but neither of them had discovered who Crosbie was till they were close upon him.

Lily was seated between Mrs Thorne and Mrs Smith, and Siph Dunn had been standing immediately opposite to them.  Fowler Pratt, who had been drawn into the circle against his will, was now standing close to Dunn, almost between him and Lily—­and Crosbie was standing within two yards of Lily, on the other side of Dunn.  Emily and Bernard had gone behind Pratt and Crosbie to Mrs Thorne’s side before they had recognised the two men;—­and in this way Lily was completely surrounded.  Mrs Thorne, who in spite of her eager, impetuous ways, was as thoughtful of others as any woman could be, as soon as she heard Crosbie’s name understood it all, and knew that it would be well that she should withdraw Lily from her plight.  Crosbie, in his attempt to talk to Mrs Smith, had smiled and simpered, and had then felt that to smile and simper before Lily Dale, with a pretended indifference to her presence, was false on his part, and would seem to be mean.  He would have avoided Lily for both their sakes, had it been possible; but it was no longer possible, and he could not keep his eyes from her face.  Hardly knowing what he did, he bowed to her, lifted his hat, and uttered some word of greeting.

Lily, from the moment that she had perceived his presence, had looked straight before her, with something of fierceness in her eyes.  Both Pratt and Siph Dunn had observed her narrowly.  It had seemed as though Crosbie had been altogether outside the ken of her eyes, or the notice of her ears, and yet she had seen every motion of his body, and had heard every word which had fallen from his lips.  Now, when he saluted her, she turned her face full upon him, and bowed to him.  Then she rose from her seat, and made her way, between Siph Dunn and Pratt, out of the circle.  The blood had mounted to her face and suffused it all, and her whole manner was such that it could escape the observation of none who stood there.  Even Mrs Harold Smith had seen it, and had read the story.