Philip meanwhile was assuredly doing everything to justify the observations of our two misogynists aforesaid. The expression of his face as he walked beside Laura Daventer, the tone of his voice as he talked to her, told quite enough. The past fortnight of daily companionship had done its work. Already there was a familiar, confidential ring in his tone—a semi-caressing expression in his eyes, which told unmistakably that he more than half considered her his own property. And what of Laura herself?
She, for her part, seemed disposed to take kindly to this state of affairs. She had tacitly acquiesced in the gradual proprietorship he had set up over her—had even abetted his efforts to glare off any presumptuous intruder who should seek to infringe his monopoly. The present arrangement suited her very well—on the whole, very well indeed.
“Do you really mean, Mrs Daventer,” Philip was saying, talking across Laura to her mother—“do you really mean you are going away at the end of this week?”
“I’m afraid so. We have been a long time abroad already, and we can’t remain away from home for ever.”
“N-no, I suppose not,” he assented, ruefully. “But what on earth shall I do here when you’re gone?”
“Just what you did before we came,” answered Laura, mischievously. “There are plenty more people here.”
“Just as if that’s the same thing! I don’t believe I’ll stay on myself. In fact, I should have gone back before now if it hadn’t been for my confounded ankle.”
“And that same ‘confounded ankle’ would have been a great deal more ‘confounded’ but for us,” rejoined Laura. “You would have used it again too soon—much too soon—only we wouldn’t let you. You would have started up the Matterhorn, or done something equally insane, if we hadn’t taken care of you and kept you quiet at home.”
There was more than a substratum of truth underlying this statement. The speaker had indeed done all she said. To one of Phil’s temperament it was infinitely more congenial to lounge through the days, sitting about in sequestered nooks in the fields and woods with a very attractive girl who chose to make much of him, than to undertake sterner forms of pastime in the company of such unsympathetic spirits as Fordham and Wentworth. And therein lay an epitome of the last fortnight. These two had been thrown together. When Philip’s ankle had improved sufficiently to admit of moderate locomotion it was Laura who had been his constant companion during his earlier and experimental hobbles. Indeed, it is to be feared that the sly dog had more than once exaggerated his lameness, in justification of an appeal for support on the ground of the insufficiency of that afforded by his stick, though somehow, when the said support was very prettily accorded, the weight which he threw upon his charming prop was of the very lightest. So the bright summer days of that fortnight had passed one by one, and it was astonishing what a large proportion of the hours composing each had been spent à deux.
Thus had come about that good understanding, that sense of proprietorship definite on the part of the one, dissimulated, yet tangible and existent, on that of the other, which reigned between them. But if she intended that proprietorship to become permanent—in fact, lifelong, neither by word or sign did Laura do anything to proclaim such intention. Kind, sympathetic, companionable as she was, she could not with fairness be accused of doing anything to “throw herself at his head.” She was a perfect model of tact. When he waxed effusive, as it was Phil’s nature to do upon very slight provocation, she would meet him with a stand-offishness the more disconcerting that it was wholly unexpected. Sometimes, even, she would invent some excuse for leaving him alone for half a day—just long enough to cause him grievously to miss her, yet not long enough to render him disgusted and resentful. But withal she had managed that her presence should be very necessary to him, and now her forethought and cleverness had their reward, for she knew she could bring him to her feet any moment she chose.