Ricky Fleet leaned his weight on the window-sill with both hands.
"You know," he said, "there's a row going on over there." "A what?"
"A row. Don't ask me how I know; can't you feel it? Besides, I've been expecting one." "Why?"
"I suppose," Ricky grunted, "I ought have been at home to greet the guests. But I start gassing, and time gets mixed up. Then Ruth rang up the Manor just before you rang me. Jenny talked to her." He hesitated. "Jenny wasn't any less gentle than she always is. But she sounded too — sugary. Like a woman waiting for a time and place to blow up. You know what I mean?"
Even as he spoke Jenny said a last few words, lifting her shoulder, and moved away. She glanced towards the window where Ricky and Martin were standing. Her gait faltered and grew slow, but she continued; and automatically swung the thin blue pullover at her side. When Martin saw his companion's shoulders grow rigid, he realized something else.
"What the hell," Ricky blurted, "am I going to tell her?"
The door opened, framing Jenny against sunlight Pouring embarrassment flooded into that room, holding all three motionless. Martin saw Ricky brace himself for an actor's role in some heroic speech of renunciation; he even saw Ricky glance at himself in a flyblown mirror to make sure the posture was right But it was Jenny who spoke.
"It's all right" she said, looking at the floor. "I knew it was all right as soon as I saw you two shake hands."
The embarrassment remained, but the tension had gone.
"It wouldn't have worked, you know," growled Ricky.