‘The young people are too much flushed, every one of them. A day like this may lay the seeds of lifelong malady. I know, as a fact, Mrs. Thorne, that Rosie is dancing in wet shoes.’
‘Better dance than sit still in them,’ remarked Linda, cheerfully. ‘You never catch cold while you are amused.’
‘Could we not have been amused at a quarter the cost? I have been trying in my own mind to reckon up the expenses of the expedition. Putting everything at the lowest, I bring it to something fabulous—fabulous! If these young subalterns, sons, no doubt, of needy men, had only given us a tea-drinking on L’Ancresse Common! When Colonel Verschoyle was in command——’
The time when her colonel commanded a regiment in Guernsey was Mrs. Verschoyle’s one unchequered recollection, the standard by which all subsequent mortal events must be judged!
‘When poor Colonel Verschoyle was in command, that is what the officers used to do. Give us a tea-drinking at L’Ancresse and a dance for the young people afterwards. No show. Very little expense. Everybody pleased. Then, of course, if you got your shoes wet you could change them.’
The advantages of L’Ancresse over Langrune as a spot whereat to change your shoes seemed to touch Mrs. Verschoyle nearly. Her eyes filled.
‘The money that has gone on all this,’ she mourned; ‘not to speak of the doctors’ bills we may have to pay hereafter! When first the plan was chalked out I foresaw how everything would end. I entreated Rosie to reason with Lord Rex. Unfortunately I can never get my children to listen to me.’
‘You should have gained over Mrs. Arbuthnot,’ said Linda, with a spice of malice. ‘As the picnic was got up for her, no doubt she could have amended the programme.’
Mrs. Verschoyle looked more like a little bewildered white mouse than usual, as this newly propounded idea made its way slowly to her intelligence.
‘It is a most unprecedented thing! To get up a party of pleasure for a married lady without daughters! Mrs. Arbuthnot, I believe, has no daughters?—at all events not of an age to be introduced. Well, she is a very sweet-looking young woman,’ said the meek, motherly soul, through whose lips no breath of scandal ever passed. ‘Mrs. Arbuthnot has just that fair, placid, large look that used to be so much admired in my Flo. But the complexion is too transparent for health. Did I tell you Flo’s husband was ordered to Malta? His regiment is on this season’s reliefs, and Flo talks of coming over to me with the children—four babies, and a native nurse. I suppose I shall be able to take them all in?’