"Hullo, Percy, dear," she said, meeting her brother's accusing eye with the perfect composure that comes only from a thoroughly guilty conscience. "What's all this I hear about your being the Scourge of London? Reggie says that policemen dive down manholes when they see you coming." The chill in the air would have daunted a less courageous girl. Lady Caroline had risen, and was staring sternly. Percy was pulling the puffs of an overwrought soul. Lord Marshmoreton, whose thoughts had wandered off to the rose garden, pulled himself together and tried to look menacing. Maud went on without waiting for a reply. She was all bubbling gaiety and insouciance, a charming picture of young English girlhood that nearly made her brother foam at the mouth. "Father dear," she said, attaching herself affectionately to his buttonhole, "I went round the links in eighty-three this morning. I did the long hole in four. One under par, a thing I've never done before in my life." ("Bless my soul," said Lord Marshmoreton weakly, as, with an apprehensive eye on his sister, he patted his daughter's shoulder.) "First, I sent a screecher of a drive right down the middle of the fairway. Then I took my brassey and put the ball just on the edge of the green. A hundred and eighty yards if it was an inch. My approach putt--" Lady Caroline, who was no devotee of the royal and ancient game, interrupted the recital. "Never mind what you did this morning. What did you do yesterday afternoon?" "Yes," said Lord Belpher. "Where were you yesterday afternoon?" Maud's gaze was the gaze of a young child who has never even attempted to put anything over in all its little life. "Whatever do you mean?" "What were you doing in Piccadilly yesterday afternoon?" said Lady Caroline. "Piccadilly? The place where Percy fights policemen? I don't understand." Lady Caroline was no sportsman. She put one of those direct questions, capable of being answered only by "Yes" or "No", which ought not to be allowed in controversy. They are the verbal equivalent of shooting a sitting bird. "Did you or did you not go to London yesterday, Maud?"