"And so this is the wonderful Golden Butterfly that you wrote to me about?" exclaimed Jess enthusiastically after the first buzz of conversation subsided.
"Yes, this is it," said Roy with great satisfaction in his tones, "and I'm proud of it, I can tell you. I think I've made a success of it."
Jess and Jimsy exchanged glances. And then Jess stole a look at Peggy, but no cloud had crossed the face of Roy's sister.
"Oh, you darling," thought Jess, "you're too sweet for anything. I just know how much you contributed to the Golden Butterfly's existence, and yet you won't detract a bit from Roy's self satisfaction."
As for Jimsy Bancroft, he said nothing. He glanced rather oddly at Roy for an instant. Then his eyes turned to Peggy's face. Perhaps they dwelt there for rather a long period of time. At any rate, they were still fixed on her brave beauty when a sudden shadow fell across the stream of sunlight that poured into the open portal of the workshop.
"Ah! So this is the place in which young genius finds its habitation;" grated out a rather harsh, unpleasant voice.
They all looked up. Perhaps none of them--Jimsy least of all--was pleased at the interruption. The newcomer was a tall, angular man, with a withered, clean-shaven face,--what Peggy called a "money making face"; and surely that described Simon Harding, as he stood there in his black, none-too-new garments, and his square-toed shoes. One could fairly catch the avaricious glint in his eyes as he squinted rapidly over the new aeroplane's outlines.
By his side stood a youth who was, so far as dress went at any rate, the exact opposite of the elder man. Fanning Harding--or Fan as he was usually called--was dressed in elaborate motoring costume. His goggles, of the latest and most exaggerated design, were shoved up off his countenance now, exposing to view a good-looking browned face. It was marred, however, by the same restless, strained look that could be seen on his father's visage.
"We're not intruding, I hope," he hastened to say, coming forward with a cordiality that seemed somewhat forced.
"Not in the least," said Peggy, hastily, realizing that none of them had perhaps looked very cordial, "won't you come in?"
Fan Harding, bestowing an admiring glance on her, seemed to be about to accept. His father, however, struck in: