"If it don"t annoy you, my referring to England so often," said she presently, "I will state that this reminds me of Kaysmere, the country place of my father-in-law."
"Is your father-in-law living yet?"
"Dear me, yes-and still has hold of the t.i.tle that I supposed I was getting when I was married to his eldest son. My father-in-law is a particularly healthy old gentleman of eighty. He was forty years old when he married. He didn"t expect to marry, you know-he couldn"t see his way to ever affording it. But he jumped into the t.i.tle suddenly and then, of course, he married right away. He had to. You"d know what a hurry he must have been in to look at my mamma-in-law"s portrait."
"Was she so very beautiful?"
"No; she was so very homely. Maude"s very like her."
Jack laughed.
She laughed, too.
"Aren"t we happy together?" she asked.
"My sky knows but one cloud," he rejoined, "and that is that Monday comes after Sunday."
"But we shall meet again," said Mrs. Rosscott. "Because," she added mischievously, "I don"t suppose that it"s on account of my cousin Maude that you rebel at the approach of Monday."
"No," said Jack. "It may not be polite to say so to you, but I wasn"t in the least thinking of your cousin."
"Poor girl!" said Mrs. Rosscott thoughtfully; "and she was so sweet to you, too. Mustn"t it be terrible to have a face like that?"
"It must indeed," said Jack; "I can think of but one thing worse."
"What?"
"To marry a face like that."
She laughed again.
"You"re cruel," she declared; "after all her face isn"t her fortune, so what does it matter?"
"It doesn"t matter at all to me," said Jack. "I know of very few things that can matter less to me than Miss Lorne"s face."
"Now, you"re cruel again; and she was so nice to you too. Absolutely, I don"t believe that the edges of her smile came together once while she was talking to you last night."
"Did you spy on us to that extent?" said Jack. "I wouldn"t have believed it of you."
"Oh, I"m very awful," she said airily. "You"ll be more surprised the farther you penetrate into the wilderness of my ways."
"And when will I have a chance to plunge into the jungle, do you think?"
"Any Sat.u.r.day or Sunday that you happen to be in town."
"Are you going to live in town?"
"For a while. I"ve taken a house until the beginning of July. I expect some friends over, and I want to entertain them."
Jack felt the sky above become refulgent. He was in the habit of spending every Sat.u.r.day night in the city-he and Burnett together.
"May I come as often as I like?" he asked.
"Certainly," said she; "because you know if you should come too often I can tell the man at the door to say I"m "not at home" to you."
"But if he ever says: "She"s not at home to you," I shall walk right in and fall upon the man that you are being at home to just then."
"But he is a very large man," said Mrs. Rosscott seriously; "he"s larger than you are, I think."
Jack felt the blue heavens breaking up into thunderbolts for his head at _this_ speech.
"But I"m "way over six feet," he said, his heart going heavily faster, even while he told himself that he might have known it, anyhow.
"He"s all of six feet two," she said meditatively. "I do believe he"s even taller. I remember liking him at the first glance, just because he struck me as so royal looking."
He was miserably conscious of acute distress.
"Do-do you mind my smoking?" he stammered.
(Might have known that, of course, there was bound to be someone like that.)
"Not at all," she rejoined amiably. "I like the odor of cigarettes. Shall I stop a little, while you set yourself afire?"
"It isn"t necessary," he said. "I can set myself afire under any circ.u.mstances."
He lit a cigarette.
"Is he English?" he couldn"t help asking then.
"Yes," she said; "I like the English."
"You appear to like everything to-day." He did not intend to seem bitter, but he did it unintentionally.
(Confounded luck some fellows have.)
"I do. I"m very well content to-day."
He was silent, thinking.
"Well," she queried, after a while.
He pulled himself together with an effort.
"I think perhaps it"s just as well," he said.
"What is just as well?"
"That I know."