"The fact is, you're not very good at pretty speeches, are you? But I don't mind that—and you know I should always be glad to see you."
Sir Axel departed well-pleased, not knowing to whom or to what the better part of his pleasure might justly be attributed. So may we profit by our neighbours' blunders, and find therein some consolation for our sufferings from their superior brilliancy.
CHAPTER XXII
JUDGMENT ACCORDINGLY
Certainly the quartette made a very agreeable party in Madeira. It proved to be as happily composed as the Major had anticipated. The two elders enjoyed the sunshine, the fine nights, the casino, much gossip with one another and with casual coevals who had anything to add. The young couple made their excursions, had their bath and a little lawn-tennis (Winnie could not be roused to enthusiasm over this), gambled mildly and danced enthusiastically. Not all these things with one another exclusively. There were other young women there, and other young men. The Major was in request among the former; Winnie among the latter. There was no overdoing of the tête-à-tête. Among the colours, the flowers, and the fun, life ran very pleasantly.
But Mrs. Lenoir was a little impatient. Her pet scheme seemed to hang fire. She could not quite make out why. It was not, she thought, the other young men and women; there was no sign of any foreign attraction such as might induce either of her predestined lovers to wander from the appointed path. Yet the Major's advances were, in her judgment, painfully deliberate, and Winnie's good fellowship with him was almost demonstratively unsentimental. Mrs. Lenoir felt her experience at fault; she had expected that, in such a favourable climate, the affair would ripen more quickly. But there are ways of forcing plants, and she was a skilful gardener.
One day, a week after the party had arrived on the island, she came out into the hotel garden after lunch and settled herself, with the General's gallant assistance, in a long chair; the spot commanded a view over the harbour. The General, his offices performed, sat in a shorter chair and smoked his cigar. Far below them the ramshackle pretty town seemed to blink in the sunshine; a rather sleepy blinking is the attitude it takes towards existence, except when a tourist ship comes in, or a squadron of men-of-war. Then it sits up, and eats, and anon sleeps again.
"I suppose, when they come down from the Mount, they'll go straight to the casino," said the General.
"Yes, I told them we'd meet them there. Hugh!"