He merely bowed with silent acquiescence in the proposition to wile away the time with tenpins, but Mrs. Laniston broke out with inexorable negation.
"No—no bowling alley to-day. The roof leaks like a riddle and the building is sopping with dampness and as chilly as a vault. What are you two thinking of?"
Lucia's countenance clouded with disappointment.
"We can't sit moping by the fire all this magnificent day, Aunt Dora," she plained.
For his life Jardine could not refrain from coming to the rescue.
"What do you say to a brisk gallop in the sunshine? The horses are in fine fettle."
"The very thing!" cried Ruth.
"I just live for the saddle!" declared Lucia, beaming with pleased anticipation.
"What a help he'll be to Mrs. Jardine (when he finds her) in making up her mind!" said Ruth, in explanatory wise to Lucia.
"How astonished Mrs. Jardine will be (when he finds her) at the way he can hit it off when he does let himself go!" said Lucia, in an affected aside to Ruth.