'She's begun it already.

Now you really must go and dress.' * * * * * When the eldest son of the house entered the drawing-room, he found everybody gathered there but his father and the Rector, who was coming to dine.

He was at once seized on by his married sisters, who saw him very rarely.

Then Pamela led him up to a tall lady in pale blue.
'My eldest brother--Miss Bremerton.' He looked at her with curiosity, and was glad when, after the arrival of his father and the Rector, it fell to him to take the new secretary in to dinner.

His father's greeting to him had been decidedly cool--the greeting of a man who sees a fight impending and wishes to give away nothing to his opponent.