'How exquisite the garden is.'

He agreed, and they went out and sat, somewhat awkwardly, on an uncomfortable stone seat.

There was a delicious half-hour of real summer sun--'One of those April days that seem a forecast of June,' as Madame Frabelle said.

'How much better it is to be here in the beautiful fresh air than squeezed into a stuffy theatre,' remarked Bruce, who was really feeling a shade jealous of Edith for seeing the revue that he had wished to see.

'Yes, indeed. There's nothing like England, I think,' she said rather irrelevantly.

'How exactly our tastes agree.'

'Do they?'

Her hand was on the edge of the seat. Somehow or other Bruce's had gone over it. She didn't appear to notice it.

'What small hands you have!' he remarked.

'Oh no! I take sixes,' said the lady, whose size was really three-quarters more than that.

He insisted on looking at the grey suede glove, and then examined her rings.

'I suppose these rings have--er--a.s.sociations for you, Madame Frabelle?'

'Ah!' she said, shaking her head. 'This one--yes, this one--the sapphire recalls old memories.' She sighed; she had bought it in the Brompton Road.

'A present from your husband, I suppose?' said Bruce, with a tinge of bitterness.

'Ah!' she answered.

She thought he was getting a little sentimental, too early in the day, and, with an effort at energy, she said:

'Let's go back to the river.'

They went back, and now Bruce began to show off his rowing powers. He had not practised for a long time, and didn't get along very quickly.

She admired his athletic talents, as though he had been a winner of the Diamond Sculls.

'If I'd stuck to it, you know,' he said, rather apologetically, 'I'd have done well in the rowing line. At one time--a good while ago--I thought of going in for Henley, in the Regatta, you know. But with that beastly Foreign Office one can't keep up anything of that sort.'

'I suppose not.'

'My muscle,' said Bruce, sticking out his arm, and hitting it rather hard, 'is fairly good, you know. Not bad for a London man who never has any practice.'

'No indeed.'

'My arm was about seventeen inches round just below the elbow at one time,' Bruce said, 'a few years ago.'

'Just fancy! Splendid!' said Madame Frabelle, who remembered that her waist was not much more a good while ago.

He told her a good many anecdotes of his prowess in the past, until tea-time.

Madame Frabelle depended greatly on tea; anything else she could do without. But a cup of tea in the afternoon was necessary to her well-being, and her animation. She became rather drowsy and absent by four o'clock.

Bruce again suggested their landing and leaving the _Belle of the River_, as they had not thought of bringing a tea-basket.

After tea, which was a great success, they became very cheery and jolly.

They went for a walk and then back to their boat.

This was the happiest time of the day.

When they reached the station, about half-past six, they found a disagreeable crowd, pushing, screaming, and singing martial songs. As they got into their first-cla.s.s carriage about a dozen third-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers sprang in, just as the train started. Bruce was furious, but nothing could be done, and the journey back to town was taken with Madame Frabelle very nearly pushed on to his knee by a rude young man who practically sat on hers, smoking a bad cigarette in her face.

They tacitly agreed to say nothing about this, and got home in time for dinner, declaring the day to have been a great success.

Bruce had really enjoyed it. Madame Frabelle said she had; though she had a certain little tenderness, half of a motherly kind, for Bruce, she far preferred his society in a comfortable house. She didn't really think he was the ideal companion for the open air. And he was struck, as he had often been before, by her curious way of contradicting herself in conversation. She took any side and argued in favour of it so long as it was striking or romantic. At one moment she would say with the greatest earnestness, for instance, that divorce should not be allowed. Marriage should be for ever, or not at all. At another moment she would argue in favour of that absurd contradiction in terms known as free love, _forgetting_ that she had completely changed round since earlier in the conversation. This was irritating, but he was still impressed with her infallibility, and Edith remarked more every day how curious that infallibility was, and how safe it was to trust. Whenever Madame Frabelle knew that something was going to happen, it didn't, and whenever she had an intuition that something was going to occur, _then_ it was pretty safe. It never would. In the same way she had only to look at a person to see them as they were not. This was so invariable it was really very convenient to have her in the house, for whatever she said was always wrong. One had _merely_ to go by contraries and her prophecies were most useful.

'It's been jolly for you,' Bruce said to Edith, 'having a ripping time in town while I'm taking your visitors about to show them England.'

'You wouldn't have cared for the theatre,' she said. 'But, fancy, I met Aylmer's son there--Aylmer Ross, you know. Aylmer himself is at the front. They have taken their old house again. He means to come back there.'

'Well, I really can't help it,' said Bruce rather fretfully. '_I_ should be at the front if it weren't for my neurotic heart. The doctor wouldn't hear of pa.s.sing me--at least one wouldn't. Any fellow who would have done so would be--not a careful man. However, I don't know that it wouldn't have been just as good to die for my country, and get some glory, as to die of heart trouble here.' He sighed.

'Oh no, you won't,' said Edith rea.s.suringly; 'you look the picture of health.'

'I've got a bit of sunburn, I think,' said Bruce, popping up to look in the gla.s.s. 'Funny how I do catch the sun. I asked Dr Pollock about it one day.'

'Really--did you consult him about your sunburn?'

'Yes. What are you smiling at, He said it's caused by the extreme delicacy of the mucous membrane; nothing to be anxious about.'

'I don't think I am anxious; not particularly. And don't worry, my dear boy; it's very becoming,' said Edith.

Bruce patted her head, and gave her a kiss, smiling.

CHAPTER VIII

'We're lunching with the Mitch.e.l.ls today,' said Edith.

'Oh yes. I remember. I'm looking forward to it,' graciously said Madame Frabelle. 'It's a pity your husband can't come, isn't it? Ah, you naughty girl, I don't believe you think so!' Madame Frabelle, archly shook her finger at Edith.

'Eglantine, have you really seriously talked yourself into thinking that Mr Mitch.e.l.l is anything to me?'

'I don't say, dear,' said Madame Frabelle, sitting down comfortably, and bringing out her knitting, 'that you yourself are aware of it. I don't say that you're in love with him, but that he is devoted to you anyone with half-an-eye can see. And some day,' she shook her head, 'some day your interest in him may take you by surprise.'

'It is _your_ interest in him that surprises me,' said Edith. 'He's a good friend, and we like him very much. But for anything else!--'

'If so, it's really rather wonderful,' mused Eglantine, 'that you've never had a thought, even the merest dream, beyond your husband; that it has never even occurred to you that anyone else might have suited your temperament better.'