then he dived into one of the great crested billows and she saw that he was making straight for her barrel. He was coming fast, but he was coming under water. When he reached the barrel Pearl was not there. Looking back, he saw her almost at the shore.
He was, however, the kind of man in whom opposition rouses a sort of malignant persistence. All through luncheon she kept catching his pale eye. She thought Durland noticed it, and hoped that Dolly didn't.
Antonia hardly moved her eyes from his face.
After lunch, when they were all in the sitting room, Antonia ran away to get him a match before anyone else had noticed he needed one. Dolly smiled.
"What's this, Allen?" she said. "Is Antonia another of your victims?"
Williams frowned, not because he was in the least annoyed but to indicate that he was a man impervious to flattery. Pearl had one of her inspirations.
"If it's true," she said, "Mr. Williams has it in his power to do us all a great favor. Do ask him, Dolly, to say to Antonia that he likes to see a little girl neatly dressed like other little girls."
"That would, indeed, be a miracle," said Dolly, not wanting anything Allen might accomplish to be underestimated.