"Well, it all makes me appreciate the country properly. I wish I knew more about gardens. Tell me all about yours. When are the raspberries ripe?"
"Not till the end of June."
"I was afraid you'd say that. May I come down and see your garden at the end of June—one day when I'm not at Earl's Court? You can give all the gardeners a holiday that day. I hate to be watched when I'm looking at flowers and things."
"Are you as fond of raspberries as all that? Why didn't I know?"
"I'm not a bit mad about them, really, but they're a symbol of Summer. On a sloshy day in November, as I grope my way through the fog, I say to myself, 'Courage, the raspberries will soon be ripe.'"
"But that means that summer is half over. The cuckoo is what I'm listening for all through November. I heard it in April this year."
I looked round to see that nobody was within earshot.
"I haven't heard it yet," I confessed. "It wasn't really so much to see the lobretias as to hear the cuckoo that I came to have tea with you. I feel just the same about it; it's the beginning of everything. And I said to myself, 'Miss Middleton may not have a first-rate show of lobretias, because possibly it is an unfavourable soil for them, or they may not fit in with the colour scheme; but she does know what is essential to a proper garden, and she'll have a cuckoo.'"
"Yes, we do ourselves very well," said Miss Middleton confidently.
"Well, I didn't like to say anything about it before, because I thought it might make you nervous, and so I've been talking of other things. But now that the secret is out, I may say that I am quite ready." I stopped and listened intently with my head on one side.