Robin's mother was a feather-brained soulless creature who abandoned her baby to a third-floor nursery at birth. The child until she was six years old was ignorant of the fact that she had a mother. At that time she meets a boy on the playground, her first playmate, the first being to show her any affection and to kiss her. After a few days the boy is suddenly removed—a cataclysmic experience to both children. Robin is a lonely child whose youth is overshadowed by her widowed mother's doubtful social position. It is known that Lord Coombe, for some mysterious reason, is paying for the gay little household. Robin somehow holds him responsible, first for Donal's sudden removal, and later for her social isolation and conceives a dislike for him. She is determined to make her own living and it is Lord Coombe who secures a place for her as companion to the dowager Duchess of Darte. here at here first party, on the eve of the war, she meets Donal again.
