“It’s just to teach them the ordinary things,” said little Miss Phyllis.
“What are the ordinary things?” I ventured to ask.
“What all girls are taught, of course, Mr. Carter,” said Mrs. Hilary. “I’ll write about it at once.” And she looked at me as if she thought that I might be about to go.
“It is a comprehensive curriculum,” I remarked, crossing my legs, “if one may judge from the results. How old are your younger sisters, Miss Phyllis?”
“Fourteen and sixteen,” she answered.
“It is a pity,” said I, “that this didn’t happen a little while back. I knew a governess who would have suited the place to a t.’”
Mrs. Hilary smiled scornfully.
“We used to meet—” I continued.
“Who used to meet?” asked Miss Phyllis.
“The governess and myself, to be sure,” said I, “under the old apple tree in the garden at the back of the house.”
“What house, Mr. Carter?”
“My father’s house, of course, Miss Phyllis. And—”
“Oh, but that must be ages ago!” cried she.
Mrs. Hilary rose, cast one glance at me, and turned to the writing table. Her pen began to scratch almost immediately.
“And under the apple tree,” I pursued, “we had many pleasant conversations.”
“What about?” asked Miss Phyllis.
“One thing and another,” I returned. “The schoolroom windows looked out that way—a circumstance which made matters more comfortable for everybody.”
“I should have thought—” began Miss Phyllis, smiling slightly, but keeping an apprehensive eye on Mrs. Hilary’s back.
“Not at all,” I interrupted. “My sisters saw us, you see. Well, of course they entertained an increased respect for me, which was all right, and a decreased respect for the governess, which was also all right. We met in the hour allotted to French lessons—by an undesigned but appropriate coincidence.”
“I shall say about thirty-five, Phyllis,” called Mrs. Hilary from the writing table.
“Yes, Cousin Mary,” called Miss Phyllis. “Did you meet often, Mr. Carter?”
“Every evening in the French hour,” said I.
“She’ll have got over any nonsense by then,” called Mrs. Hilary. “They are often full of it.”
“She had remarkably pretty hair,” I continued; “very soft it was. Dear me! I was just twenty.”
“How old was she?” asked Miss Phyllis.
“One’s first love,” said I, “is never any age. Everything went very well. Happiness was impossible. I was heartbroken, and the governess was far from happy. Ah, happy, happy times!”
“But you don’t seem to have been happy,” objected Miss Phyllis.
“Then came a terrible evening—”
“She ought to be a person of active habits,” called Mrs. Hilary.
“I think so, yes, Cousin Mary; oh, what happened, Mr. Carter?”
“And an early riser,” added Mrs. Hilary.
“Yes, Cousin Mary. What did happen, Mr. Carter?”
“My mother came in during the French hour. I don’t know whether you have observed, Miss Phyllis, how easy it is to slip into the habit of entering rooms when you had better remain outside. Now, even my friend Arch—However, that’s neither here nor there. My mother, as I say, came in.”
“Church of England, of course, Phyllis?” called Mrs. Hilary.
“Oh, of course, cousin Mary,” cried little Miss Phyllis.
“The sect makes no difference,” I observed. “Well, my sisters, like good girls, began to repeat the irregular verbs. But it was no use. We were discovered. That night, Miss Phyllis, I nearly drowned myself.”
“You must have been—Oh, how awful, Mr. Carter!”
“That is to say, I thought how effective it would be if I drowned myself. Ah, well, it couldn’t last!”
“And the governess?”
“She left next morning.”
There was a pause. Miss Phyllis looked sad and thoughtful; I smiled pensively and beat my cane against my leg.
“Have you ever seen her since?” asked Miss Phyllis.
“No.”
“Shouldn’t—shouldn’t you like to, Mr. Carter?”
“Heaven forbid!” said I.
Suddenly Mrs. Hilary pushed back her chair, and turned round to us.
“Well, I declare,” said she, “I must be growing stupid. Here have I been writing to the Agency, when I know of the very thing myself! The Polwheedles’ governess is just leaving them; she’s been there over fifteen years. Lady Polwheedle told me she was a treasure. I wonder if she’d go!”
“Is she what mamma wants?”
“My dear, you’ll be most lucky to get her. I’ll write at once and ask her to come to lunch tomorrow. I met her there. She’s an admirable person.”
Mrs. Hilary wheeled round again. I shook my head at Miss Phyllis.
“Poor children!” said I. “Manage a bit of fun for them sometimes.”
Miss Phyllis assumed a staid and virtuous air.
“They must be properly brought up, Mr. Carter,” said she.
“Is there a House Opposite?” I asked; and Miss Phyllis blushed.
Mrs. Hilary advanced, holding out a letter.
“You may as well post this for me,” said she. “Oh, and would you like to come to lunch tomorrow?”
“To meet the Paragon?”
“No. She’ll be there, of course; but you see it’s Saturday, and Hilary will be here; and I thought you might take him off somewhere and leave Phyllis and me to have a quiet talk with her.”
“That won’t amuse her much,” I ventured to remark.
“She’s not coming to be amused,” said Mrs. Hilary severely.
“All right; I’ll come,” said I, taking my hat.
“Here’s the note for Miss Bannerman,” said Mrs. Hilary.
That sort of thing never surprises me. I looked at the letter and read “Miss M. E. Bannerman.” “M. E.” stood for “Maud Elizabeth.” I put my hat back on the table.
“What sort of a looking person is this Miss Bannerman?” I asked.
“Oh, a spare, upright woman—hair a little gray, and—I don’t know how to describe it—her face looks a little weather-beaten. She wears glasses.”
“Thank you,” said I. “And what sort of a looking person am I?”
Mrs. Hilary looked scornful. Miss Phyllis opened her eyes.
“How old do I look, Miss Phyllis?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said uncomfortably.
“Guess,” said I sternly.
“F-forty-three—oh, or forty-two?” she asked, with a timid upward glance.
“When you’ve done your nonsense—” began Mrs. Hilary; but I laid a hand on her arm.
“Should you call me fat?” I asked.
“Oh, no; not fat,” said Mrs. Hilary, with a smile, which she strove to render reassuring.
“I am undoubtedly bald,” I observed.
“You’re certainly bald,” said Mrs. Hilary, with regretful candor.
I took my hat and remarked: “A man has a right to think of himself, but I am not thinking mainly of myself. I shall not come to lunch.”
“You said you would,” cried Mrs. Hilary indignantly.
I poised the letter in my hand, reading again “Miss M(aud) E(lizabeth) Bannerman.” Miss Phyllis looked at me curiously, Mrs. Hilary impatiently.
“Who knows,” said I, “that I may not be a Romance—a Vanished Dream—a Green Memory—an Oasis? A person who has the fortune to be an Oasis, Miss Phyllis, should be very careful. I will not come to lunch.”
“Do you mean that you used to know Miss Bannerman?” asked Mrs. Hilary in her pleasant prosaic way.
It was a sin seventeen years old; it would hardly count against the blameless Miss Bannerman now. “You may tell her when I’m gone,” said I to Miss Phyllis.
Miss Phyllis whispered in Mrs. Hilary’s ear.
“Another?” cried Mrs. Hilary, aghast.
“It was the very first,” said I, defending myself.
Mrs. Hilary began to laugh. I smoothed my hat.
“Tell her,” said I, “that I remembered her very well.”
“I shall do no such thing,” said Mrs. Hilary.
“And tell her,” I continued, “that I am still handsome.”
“I shan’t say a word about you,” said Mrs. Hilary.
“Ah, well, that will be better still,” said I.
“She’ll have forgotten your very name,” remarked Mrs. Hilary.
I opened the door, but a thought struck me. I turned round and observed:
“I dare say her hair’s just as soft as ever. Still—I’ll lunch some other day.”
“I see nothing whatever to laugh at,” said Mrs. Hilary coldly, when I had finished.
“I did not ask you to laugh,” I observed mildly. “I mentioned it merely as a typical case.”
“It’s not typical,” she said, and took up her embroidery. But a moment later she added:
“Poor boy! I’m not surprised.”
“I’m not surprised either,” I remarked. “It is, however, extremely deplorable.”
“It’s your own fault. Why did you introduce him?”
“A book,” I observed, “might be written on the Injustice of the Just. How could I suppose that he would—?”
By the way, I might as well state what he—that is, my young cousin George—had done. Unless one is a genius, it is best to aim at being intelligible.
Well, he was in love; and with a view of providing him with another house at which he might be likely to meet the adored object, I presented him to my friend Lady Mickleham. That was on a Tuesday. A fortnight later, as I was sitting in Hyde Park (as I sometimes do), George came up and took the chair next to me. I gave him a cigarette, but made no remark. George beat his cane restlessly against the leg of his trousers.
“I’ve got to go up tomorrow,” he remarked.
“Ah, well, Oxford is a delightful town,” said I.
“D——d hole,” observed George.
I was about to contest this opinion when a victoria drove by.
A girl sat in it, side by side with a portly lady.
“George, George!” I cried. “There she is—Look!”
George looked, raised his hat with sufficient politeness, and remarked to me:
“Hang it, one sees those people everywhere.”
I am not easily surprised, but I confess I turned to George with an expression of wonder.
“A fortnight ago—” I began.
“Don’t be an ass, Sam,” said George, rather sharply. “She’s not a bad girl, but—” He broke off and began to whistle. There was a long pause. I lit a cigar, and looked at the people.
“I lunched at the Micklehams’ today,” said George, drawing a figure on the gravel with his cane. “Mickleham’s not a bad fellow.”
“One of the best fellows alive,” I agreed.
“I wonder why she married him, though,” mused George; and he added, with apparent irrelevance, “It’s a dashed bore, going up.” And then a smile spread over his face; a blush accompanied it, and proclaimed George’s sense of delicious wickedness. I turned on him.
“Out with it!” I said.
“It’s nothing. Don’t be a fool,” said George.
“Where did you get that rose?” I asked.
“This rose?” he repeated, fondling the blossom. “It was given to me.”
Upon this I groaned—and I still consider that I had good reason for my action. It was the groan of a moralist.
“They’ve asked me to stay at The Towers next vac.,” said George, glancing at me out of the corner of an immoral eye. Perhaps he thought it too immoral, for he added, “It’s all right, Sam.” I believe that I have as much self control as most people, but at this point I chuckled.
“What the deuce are you laughing at?” asked George.
I made no answer, and he went on—
“You never told me what a—what she was like, Sam. Wanted to keep it to yourself, you old dog.”
“George—George—George!” said I. “You go up tomorrow?”
“Yes, confound it!”
“And term lasts two months?”
“Yes, hang it!”
“All is well,” said I, crossing my legs. “There is more virtue in two months than in Ten Commandments.”
George regarded me with a dispassionate air.
“You’re an awful ass sometimes,” he observed critically, and he rose from his seat.
“Must you go?” said I.
“Yes—got a lot of things to do. Look here, Sam, don’t go and talk about—”
“Talk about what?”
“Anything, you old idiot,” said George, with a pleased smile, and he dug me in the ribs with his cane, and departed.
I sat on, admiring the simple elements which constitute the happiness of the young. Alas! With advancing years, Wrong loses half its flavor! To be improper ceases, by itself, to satisfy.
Immersed in these reflections, I failed to notice that a barouche had stopped opposite to me; and suddenly I found a footman addressing me.
“Beg your pardon, sir,” he said. “Her ladyship wishes to speak to you.”
“It is a blessed thing to be young, Martin,” I observed.
“Yes, sir,” said Martin. “It’s a fine day, sir.”
“But very short,” said I. Martin is respectful, and said nothing—to me, at least. What he said to the coachman, I don’t know.
And then I went up to Dolly.
“Get in and drive round,” suggested Dolly.
“I can’t,” said I. “I have a bad nose.”
“What’s the matter with your nose?” asked Dolly, smiling.
“The joint is injured,” said I, getting into the barouche. And I added severely, “I suppose I’d better sit with my back to the horses?”
“Oh, no, you’re not my husband,” said Dolly. “Sit here;” and she made room by her, as she continued, “I rather like Mr. George.”
“I’m ashamed of you,” I observed. “Considering your age—”
“Mr. Carter!”
“Considering, I say, his age, your conduct is scandalous. I shall never introduce any nice boys to you again.”
“Oh, please do,” said Dolly, clasping her hands.
“You give them roses,” said I, accusingly. “You make them false to their earliest loves—”
“She was a pudding-faced thing,” observed Dolly.
I frowned. Dolly, by an accident, allowed the tip of her finger to touch my arm for an instant.
“He’s a nice boy,” said she. “How like he is to you, Mr. Carter!”
“I am a long way past that,” said I. “I am thirty-six.”
“If you mean to be disagreeable!” said she turning away. “I beg your pardon for touching you, Mr. Carter.”
“I did not notice it, Lady Mickleham.”
“Would you like to get out?”
“It’s miles from my club,” said I discontentedly.
“He’s such fun,” said Dolly, with a sudden smile. “He told Archie that I was the most charming woman in London! You’ve never done that!”
“He said the same about the pudding-faced girl,” I observed.
There was a pause. Then Dolly asked:
“How is your nose?”
“The carriage exercise is doing it good,” said I.
“If,” observed Dolly, “he is so silly, now, what will he be at your age?”
“A wise man,” said I.
“He suggested that I might write to him,” bubbled Dolly.
Now when Dolly bubbles—an operation which includes a sudden turn towards me, a dancing of eyes, a dart of a small hand, a hurried rush of words, checked and confused by a speedier gust of gurgling sound—I am in the habit of ceasing to argue the question. Bubbling is not to be met by arguing. I could only say:
“He’ll have forgotten by the end of the term.”
“He’ll remember two days later,” retorted Dolly.
“Stop the carriage,” said I. “I shall tell Mrs. Hilary all about it.”
“I won’t stop the carriage,” said Dolly. “I’m going to take you home with me.”
“I am at a premium today,” I said sardonically.
“One must have something,” said Dolly. “How is your nose now, Mr. Carter?”
I looked at Dolly. I had better not have done that.
“Would afternoon tea hurt it?” she inquired anxiously.
“It would do it good,” said I decisively.
And that is absolutely the whole story. And what in the world Mrs. Hilary found to disapprove of I don’t know—especially as I didn’t tell her half of it! But she did disapprove. However, she looks very well when she disapproves.
We were talking over the sad case of young Algy Groom; I was explaining to Mrs. Hilary exactly what had happened.
“His father gave him,” said I, “a hundred pounds, to keep him for three months in Paris while he learnt French.”
“And very liberal too,” said Mrs. Hilary.
“It depends where you dine,” said I. “However, that question did not arise, for Algy went to the Grand Prix the day after he arrived—”
“A horse race?” asked Mrs. Hilary with great contempt.
“Certainly the competitors are horses,” I rejoined. “And there he, most unfortunately, lost the whole sum, without learning any French to speak of.”
“How disgusting!” exclaimed Mrs. Hilary, and little Miss Phyllis gasped in horror.
“Oh, well,” said Hilary, with much bravery (as it struck me), “his father’s very well off.”
“That doesn’t make it a bit better, declared his wife.
“There’s no mortal sin in a little betting, my dear. Boys will be boys—”
“And even that,” I interposed, “wouldn’t matter if we could only prevent girls from being girls.”
Mrs. Hilary, taking no notice whatever of me, pronounced sentence. “He grossly deceived his father,” she said, and took up her embroidery.
“Most of us have grossly deceived our parents before now,” said I. “We should all have to confess to something of the sort.”
“I hope you’re speaking for your own sex,” observed Mrs. Hilary.
“Not more than yours,” said I. “You used to meet Hilary on the pier when your father wasn’t there—you told me so.”
“Father had authorized my acquaintance with Hilary.”
“I hate quibbles,” said I.
There was a pause. Mrs. Hilary stitched; Hilary observed that the day was fine.
“Now,” I pursued carelessly, “even Miss Phyllis here has been known to deceive her parents.”
“Oh, let the poor child alone, anyhow,” said Mrs. Hilary.
“Haven’t you?” said I to Miss Phyllis.
I expected an indignant denial. So did Mrs. Hilary, for she remarked with a sympathetic air:
“Never mind his folly, Phyllis dear.”
“Haven’t you, Miss Phyllis?” said I.
Miss Phyllis grew very red. Fearing that I was causing her pain, I was about to observe on the prospects of a Dissolution when a shy smile spread over Miss Phyllis’s face.
“Yes, once,” said she with a timid glance at Mrs. Hilary, who immediately laid down her embroidery.
“Out with it,” I cried, triumphantly. “Come along, Miss Phyllis. We won’t tell, honor bright!”
Miss Phyllis looked again at Mrs. Hilary. Mrs. Hilary is human:
“Well, Phyllis, dear,” said she, “after all this time I shouldn’t think it my duty—”
“It only happened last summer,” said Miss Phyllis.
Mrs. Hilary looked rather put out.
“Still,” she began.
“We must have the story,” said I.
Little Miss Phyllis put down the sock she had been knitting.
“I was very naughty,” she remarked. “It was my last term at school.”
“I know that age,” said I to Hilary.
“My window looked out towards the street. You’re sure you won’t tell? Well, there was a house opposite—”
“And a young man in it,” said I.
“How did you know that?” asked Miss Phyllis, blushing immensely.
“No girls’ school can keep up its numbers without one,” I explained.
“Well, there was, anyhow,” said Miss Phyllis. “And I and two other girls went to a course of lectures at the Town Hall on literature or something of that kind. We used to have a shilling given us for our tickets.”
“Precisely,” said I. “A hundred pounds!”
“No, a shilling,” corrected Miss Phyllis. “A hundred pounds! How absurd, Mr. Carter! Well, one day I—I—”
“You’re sure you wish to go on, Phyllis?” asked Mrs. Hilary.
“You’re afraid, Mrs. Hilary,” said I severely.
“Nonsense, Mr. Carter. I thought Phyllis might—”
“I don’t mind going on,” said Miss Phyllis, smiling. “One day I—I lost the other girls.”
“The other girls are always easy to lose,” I observed.
“And on the way there—oh, you know, he went to the lectures.”
“The young dog,” said I, nudging Hilary. “I should think he did!”
“On the way there it became rather—rather foggy.”
“Blessings on it!” I cried; for little Miss Phyllis’s demure but roguish expression delighted me.
“And he—he found me in the fog.”
“What are you doing, Mr. Carter?” cried Mrs. Hilary angrily.
“Nothing, nothing,” said I. I believe I had winked at Hilary.
“And—we couldn’t find the Town Hall.”
“Oh, Phyllis!” groaned Mrs. Hilary.
Little Miss Phyllis looked alarmed for a moment. Then she smiled.
“But we found the confectioner’s,” said she.
“The Grand Prix,” said I, pointing my forefinger at Hilary.
“He had no money at all,” said Miss Phyllis.
“It’s ideal!” said I.
“And—and we had tea on—on—”
“The shilling?” I cried in rapture.
“Yes,” said little Miss Phyllis, “on the shilling. And he saw me home.”
“Details, please,” said I.
Little Miss Phyllis shook her head.
“And left me at the door.”
“Was it still foggy?” I asked.
“Yes. Or he wouldn’t have—”
“Now what did he—?”
“Come to the door, Mr. Carter,” said Miss Phyllis, with obvious wariness. “Oh, and it was such fun!”
“I’m sure it was.”
“No, I mean when we were examined in the lectures. I bought the local paper, you know, and read it up, and I got top marks easily, and Miss Green wrote to mother to say how well I had done.”
“It all ends most satisfactorily,” I observed.
“Yes, didn’t it?” said little Miss Phyllis.
Mrs. Hilary was grave again.
“And you never told your mother, Phyllis?” she asked.
“N-no, Cousin Mary,” said Miss Phyllis.
I rose and stood with my back to the fire. Little Miss Phyllis took up her sock again, but a smile still played about the corners of her mouth.
“I wonder,” said I, looking up at the ceiling, “what happened at the door.” Then, as no one spoke, I added:
“Pooh! I know what happened at the door.”
“I’m not going to tell you anything more,” said Miss Phyllis.
“But I should like to hear it in your own—”
Miss Phyllis was gone! She had suddenly risen and run from the room!
“It did happen at the door,” said I.
“Fancy Phyllis!” mused Mrs. Hilary.
“I hope,” said I, “that it will be a lesson to you.”
“I shall have to keep my eye on her,” said Mrs. Hilary.
“You can’t do it,” said I in easy confidence. I had no fear of little Miss Phyllis being done out of her recreations. “Meanwhile,” I pursued, “the important thing is this: my parallel is obvious and complete.”
“There’s not the least likeness,” said Mrs. Hilary sharply.
“As a hundred pounds are to a shilling, so is the Grand Prix to the young man opposite,” I observed, taking my hat, and holding out my hand to Mrs. Hilary.
“I am very angry with you,” she said. “You’ve made the child think there was nothing wrong in it.”
“Oh! Nonsense,” said I. “Look how she enjoyed telling it.”
Then, not heeding Mrs. Hilary, I launched into an apostrophe.
“O, divine House Opposite!” I cried. “Charming House Opposite! If only I might dwell forever in the House Opposite!”
“I haven’t the least notion of what you mean,” remarked Mrs. Hilary, stiffly. “I suppose it’s something silly—or worse.”
I looked at her in some puzzle.
“Have you no longing for the House Opposite?” I asked.
Mrs. Hilary looked at me. Her eyes ceased to be absolutely blank. She put her arm through Hilary’s and answered gently—
“I don’t want the House Opposite.”
“Ah,” said I, giving my hat a brush, “but maybe you remember the House—when it was Opposite?”
Mrs. Hilary, one arm still in Hilary’s, gave me her hand. She blushed and smiled.
“Well,” said she, “it was your fault; so I won’t scold Phyllis.”
“No, don’t my dear,” said Hilary, with a laugh.
As for me, I went downstairs, and, in absence of mind, bade my cabman drive to the House Opposite. But I have never got there.
“It will be dull enough, anyhow,” said Dolly, fretfully. “Besides, it’s awfully bourgeois to go to the theater with one’s husband.”
“Bourgeois,” I observed, “is an epithet which the riffraff apply to what is respectable, and the aristocracy to what is decent.”
“But it’s not a nice thing to be, all the same,” said Dolly, who is impervious to the most penetrating remark.
“You’re in no danger of it,” I hastened to assure her.
“How should you describe me, then?” she asked, leaning forward, with a smile.
“I should describe you, Lady Mickleham,” I replied discreetly, “as being a little lower than the angels.”
Dolly’s smile was almost a laugh as she asked:
“How much lower, please, Mr. Carter?”
“Just by the depth of your dimples,” said I thoughtlessly.
Dolly became immensely grave.
“I thought,” said she, “that we never mentioned them now, Mr. Carter.”
“Did we ever?” I asked innocently.
“I seemed to remember once: do you recollect being in very low spirits one evening at Monte?”
“I remember being in very low water more than one evening there.”
“Yes; you told me you were terribly hard-up.”
“There was an election in our division that year,” I remarked, “and I remitted 30 percent of my rents.”
“You did—to M. Blanc,” said Dolly. “Oh, and you were very dreary! You said you’d wasted your life and your time and your opportunities.”
“Oh, you mustn’t suppose I never have any proper feelings,” said I complacently.
“I think you were hardly yourself.”
“Do be more charitable.”
“And you said that your only chance was in gaining the affection of—”
“Surely, I was not such an—so foolish?” I implored.
“Yes, you were. You were sitting close by me—”
“Oh, then, it doesn’t count,” said I, rallying a little.
“On a bench. You remember the bench?”
“No, I don’t,” said I, with a kind but firm smile.
“Not the bench?”
“No.”
Dolly looked at me, then she asked in an insinuating tone—
“When did you forget it, Mr. Carter?”
“The day you were buried,” I rejoined.
“I see. Well, you said then what you couldn’t possibly have meant.”
“I dare say. I often did.”
“That they were—”
“That what were?”
“Why, the—the—what we’re talking about.”
“What we were—? Oh, to be sure, the—the blemishes?”
“Yes, the blemishes. You said they were the most—”
“Oh, well, it was a facon de parler.”
“I was afraid you weren’t a bit sincere,” said Dolly humbly.
“Well, judge by yourself,” said I with a candid air.
“But I said nothing!” cried Dolly.
“It was incomparably the most artistic thing to do,” said I.
“I’m sometimes afraid you don’t do me justice, Mr. Carter,” remarked Dolly with some pathos.
I did not care to enter upon that discussion, and a pause followed. Then Dolly, in a timid manner, asked me—
“Do you remember the dreadful thing that happened the same evening?”
“That chances to remain in my memory,” I admitted.
“I’ve always thought it kind of you never to speak of it,” said she.
“It is best forgotten,” said I, smiling.
“We should have said the same about anybody,” protested Dolly.
“Certainly. We were only trying to be smart,” said I.
“And it was horribly unjust.”
“I quite agree with you, Lady Mickleham.”
“Besides, I didn’t know anything about him then. He had only arrived that day, you see.”
“Really we were not to blame,” I urged.
“Oh, but doesn’t it seem funny?”
“A strange whirligig, no doubt,” I mused.
There was a pause. Then the faintest of smiles appeared on Dolly’s face.
“He shouldn’t have worn such clothes,” she said, as though in self defense. “Anybody would have looked absurd in them.”
“It was all the clothes,” I agreed. “Besides, when a man doesn’t know a place, he always moons about and looks—”
“Yes. Rather awkward, doesn’t he, Mr. Carter?”
“And the mere fact of his looking at you—”
“At us, please.”
“Is nothing, although we made a grievance of it at the time.”
“That was very absurd of you,” said Dolly.
“It was certainly unreasonable of us,” said I.
“We ought have known he was a gentleman.”
“But we scouted the idea of it,” said I.
“It was a most curious mistake to make,” said Dolly.
“O, well, it’s put right now,” said I.
“Oh, Mr. Carter, do you remember mamma’s face when we described him?”
“That was a terrible moment,” said I, with a shudder.
“I said he was—ugly,” whispered Dolly.
“And I said—something worse,” murmured I.
“And mamma knew at once from our description that it was—”
“She saw it in a minute,” said I.
“And then you went away.”
“Well, I rather suppose I did,” said I.
“Mamma is just a little like the Dowager sometimes,” said Dolly.
“There is a touch now and then,” I conceded.
“And when I was introduced to him the next day I absolutely blushed.”
“I don’t altogether wonder at that,” I observed.
“But it wasn’t as if he’d heard what we were saying.”
“No; but he’d seen what we were doing.”
“Well, what were we doing?” cried Dolly defiantly.
“Conversing confidentially,” said I.
“And a week later you went home!”
“Just one week later,” said I.
There was a long pause.
“Well, you’ll take me to the theater?” asked Dolly, with something which, if I were so disposed, I might consider a sigh.
“I’ve seen the piece twice,” said I.
“How tiresome of you! You’ve seen everything twice.”
“I’ve seen some things much oftener,” I observed.
“I’ll get a nice girl for you to talk to, and I’ll have a young man.”
“I don’t want my girl to be too nice,” I observed.
“She shall be pretty,” said Dolly generously.
“I don’t mind if I do come with you,” said I. “What becomes of Archie?”
“He’s going to take his mother and his sisters to the Albert Hall.”
My face brightened.
“I am unreasonable,” I admitted.
“Sometimes you are,” said Dolly.
“I have much to be thankful for. Have you ever observed a small boy eat a penny ice?”
“Of course I have,” said Dolly.
“What does he do when he’s finished it?”
“Stop, I suppose.”
“On the contrary,” said I, “he licks the glass.”
“Yes, he does,” said Dolly meditatively.
“It’s not so bad—licking the glass,” said I.
Dolly stood opposite me, smiling. At this moment Archie entered. He had been working at his lathe. He is very fond of making things which he doesn’t want, and then giving them to people who have no use for them.
“How are you, old chap?” he began. “I’ve just finished an uncommon pretty—”
He stopped, paralyzed by a cry from Dolly—
“Archie, what in the world are you wearing?”
I turned a startled gaze upon Archie.
“It’s just an old suit I routed out,” said he apologetically.
I looked at Dolly; her eyes were closed shut, and she gasped—
“My dear, dear boy, go and change it!”
“I don’t see why it’s not—”
“Go and change it, if you love me,” besought Dolly.
“Oh, all right.”
“You look hideous in it,” she said, her eyes still shut.
Archie, who is very docile, withdrew. A guilty silence reigned for some moments. Then Dolly opened her eyes. “It was the suit,” she said, with a shudder. “Oh, how it all came back to me!”
“I could wish,” I observed, taking my hat, “that it would all come back to me.”
“I wonder if you mean that!”
“As much as I ever did,” said I earnestly.
“And that is—?
“Quite enough.”
“How tiresome you are!” she said, turning away with a smile.
Outside I met Archie in another suit.
“A quick change, eh, my boy?” said he.
“It took just a week,” I remarked absently.
Archie stared.