"Why, Jack Pennington!"
"Miss Bocock, luckily, was on the other side of the veranda, so that I had only to go round to her afterward and tell her that Mrs. Upton had suggested their gardening, but that since she was going to drive with Sir Basil she could go off to the club, at once, too, with Imogen."
"But, Jack!—what did you mean by it?"—Mary, quite aghast, stared at her
Machiavellian friend.
"Why, that Sir Basil should take her. That's all I meant from the beginning, when I proposed going myself. Do forgive me, you dear old brick. You see, I'm so awfully set on her not being done out of things."
"Done out of things?"
"Oh, little things, if you like, young things. She's young, and she ought to have them. Say you forgive me."
"Of course, Jack dear, I forgive you, though I don't understand you. But that's not the point. Everything seems so queer, so twisted; every one seems different. And to find you not straight is worst of all."
"I promise you, it's my last sin," said Jack.
Mary, though shaking her bewildered head, had to smile a little, and, the smile encouraging him to lightness, he remarked on her changed aspect.
"So do forgive and forget. I had to confess, when I'd not been true to you.
Really, my nature isn't warped. What an extremely becoming dress that is
Mary;—and what have you done to your hair?"