Page:O'Higgins--The Adventures of Detective Barney.djvu/140

 in her affectionate air of greeting. She put one hand on Barney’s shoulder, as she led him to the table, patting him as if he were a child. He was a child, forthwith. Instinctively, quite without craft, and almost unconscious of the fact that he was acting a part, he became an ingenuous youngster without a trace of guile.

Whately did not notice the change at first; for Mary, as they crossed the room, secretly found his hand and spoke to it in a dumb pressure that was eloquent: it took all his mind to her, warmly.

“Did you sleep well?” she asked Barney.

“I don’t remember,” he said—and joined in their amusement, naïvely unabashed.

He stared around at the room like an interested infant. It was a sort of room that he had never seen before—with silvery gray woodwork and yellow sash-curtains, silk rugs and a hardwood floor, a bear skin before a huge fireplace, a cottage piano, furniture of severe oak upholstered in Spanish leather,