Sybella reddened, and turned from her gouty Admiral, who had wisely listened without comment, to the offender.
"I assure you—" she interposed—"I assure you, the wind has been exactly south all day. I watched the clouds for ever so long; and they were coming precisely from the south. Some may be so easily mistaken, because of currents of air down here; but up there, you know, one cannot be wrong."
Miss Devereux was nothing if not scientific.
"And I know—The weathercock! Oh, I don't think one can always depend on weathercocks. Beside, the weathercock must have pointed south to-day. I know by my own feelings. Any east in the wind always affects me directly. I am so sensitive to an east wind. It has been direct south the whole day."
Mr. Trevelyan bowed slightly, and intimated that a gentleman might not contradict a lady.
"But anybody must know who has paid attention," persisted the lady, feeling the gentleman unconvinced. Miss Devereux not only counted herself always in the right; she could not be content unless others counted her the same; and this was rather difficult to bring about. "I assure you, if there had been the very least east in the wind, I could not have ventured out with my neuralgia. East winds are so dangerous. People who are strong, of course—But it was because the wind was south that I thought it so safe."
Mr. Trevelyan bowed again. He had a way of looking down upon Sybella, mentally as well as bodily, from his superior height, which she was conscious of, while unable to define it.
For the hundredth time, she wondered, "What dear Cyril could find to like in that disagreeable man?"
And her voice had an injured intonation as she continued—
"It is quite extraordinary how few people understand the direction of the wind."