"We have seen nothing of you yet, Pamela," she said stiffly. "You had better stay with us and we will drop you on our way home."
"I am coming with you to-morrow, you know," she reminded her aunt. "To-night I am Mr. Lutchester's guest and he will see me home."
Mrs. Hastings drew her niece a little closer to her.
"Is this part of your European manners, Pamela?" she whispered, "that you dine alone in a restaurant with an acquaintance? Let me tell you frankly that I dislike the idea most heartily. My chaperonage is always at your service, and any girl of your age in America would be delighted to avail herself of it."
"It is very kind of you, aunt," Pamela replied, "but in a general way I finished with chaperons long ago."
"Where is Jimmy?" Mrs. Hastings inquired.
"He was coming with us to-night," Pamela explained, "but I asked him particularly to stay away. I have seen so little of Mr. Lutchester since he arrived, and I want to talk to him."
The financial magnate awoke from a comatose inertia and suddenly gripped Lutchester by the hand.
"Lutchester," he repeated to himself. "I thought I knew your face. Stayed with your uncle down at Monte Carlo once. You came there for a week."
Lutchester acknowledged his recollection of the fact and the two men exchanged a few commonplace remarks. Mrs. Hastings took the opportunity to try and induce Pamela to converse with Fischer.
"We have all been so interested to-night," she said, "in hearing what Mr. Fischer has to say about the situation on the other side."
"Has Mr. Fischer been telling you fairy tales?" she laughed.
"Fairy tales?" her aunt repeated severely. "I don't understand."
Fischer's steel grey eyes flashed behind his spectacles.
"I'm afraid that Miss Van Teyl's prejudices," he observed bitterly, "are very firmly fixed."
"Then she is no true American," Mrs. Hastings pronounced didactically.
"Oh, I can assure you that I am not prejudiced," Pamela declared, "only, you see, I, too, have just arrived from the other side, and I have been able to use my own eyes and judgment. If there is any prejudice in the matter, why should it not come from Mr. Fischer? He has the very good excuse of his German birth."
"Mr. Fischer is an American citizen," Mrs. Hastings reminded her niece, "and personally, I think that the American of German birth is one of the most loyal and long-suffering persons I know. I cannot say as much for the English people who are living over here. And as to fairy stories--"