"I say that you are a foolish girl," said Lady Laura, "and that I will have nothing to do with such a scheme."
"Then there is nothing for it but that you should come here; and as you live in the house, and as I am sure to be here every morning, and as you have no possible occupation for your time, and as we have nothing particular to do with ours,—I daresay I shan't see you again before I go to my aunt's in Berkeley Square."
"Very likely not," he said.
"And why not, Oswald?" asked his sister.
He passed his hand over his face before he answered her. "Because she and I run in different grooves now, and are not such meet playfellows as we used to be once. Do you remember my taking you away right through Saulsby Wood once on the old pony, and not bringing you back till tea-time, and Miss Blink going and telling my father?"
"Do I remember it? I think it was the happiest day in my life. His pockets were crammed full of gingerbread and Everton toffy, and we had three bottles of lemonade slung on to the pony's saddlebows. I thought it was a pity that we should ever come back."
"It was a pity," said Lord Chiltern.
"But, nevertheless, substantially necessary," said Lady Laura.
"Failing our power of reproducing the toffy, I suppose it was," said Violet.
"You were not Miss Effingham then," said Lord Chiltern.