Sir Joseph grunted again.
"It's making Cleopatra quite ill. Agatha says it is, and I'm sure she's right. She fainted in the billiard-room this afternoon and her head was within an inch of the fender. The poor girl almost killed herself. Besides, I hate a child to have her head turned by a man of thirty. It's such easy going for him, and she's too young to know the difference between an actor and a coachman."
"I'll see what I can do," said the baronet, stirring himself a little. "But you'll admit the position is delicate."
"It's so absurd, because Leonetta has not got the marks of the cradle off her back yet."
"A child as fascinating as her dear mother," Sir Joseph interposed, taking the widow's hand.
She brushed his fingers from her. "I've lost patience with him," she cried. "What is it makes these young Englishmen always abandon full-blown maturity for flapperdom? I suppose it is the tradition of their manufacturing race to worship raw material."
"Oh, he's not in love with her," Sir Joseph objected.
In another part of the park Miss Mallowcoid, Agatha, and Cleopatra were walking arm-in-arm. Miss Mallowcoid, always stirred to some act of self-sacrificing devotion by the sight of genuine illness, was making it her duty to give her niece a little healthy exercise before going to bed. Cleopatra would have given a good deal to escape this determined altruism on her aunt's part, but Miss Mallowcoid was not so easily thwarted in the practice of her virtues.
Meanwhile, Denis, surrounded by the rest of the party, was indulging in a form of amusement that he had popularised of late among the younger members of the two households. It consisted in a sort of uneven cock-fight between himself and Gerald Tribe, on the question of religion, and it was punctuated by roars of laughter from Leonetta, Vanessa, Guy Tyrrell, and even Stephen Fearwell; while the unfortunate Mrs. Tribe, feeling that her husband was being made to look ridiculous for the edification of the rest of the party, would repeatedly interrupt the proceedings by urging her spouse to "come to bed." This, however, he always resolutely refused to do, much to the satisfaction of everybody present; and the unequal contest would be continued.
Sometimes the sensitive and sensible woman would interpolate a remark which considerably discomfited her husband's aggressor; and then, hoping to bring the controversy quickly to an end on this note of triumph, would tug vigorously at his coat sleeve. But Incandescent Gerald, hot, excited, beaten, and indignant, was not to be lured away to the marital bed while he still smarted from his opponent's blows, and endeavouring ever afresh to turn the tide of battle, would remain to blunder on into another rout.