“Oh no! She’s eaten all the rose-leaves she wants, and I’m sure she’s not the least interested in Apuleius.”
Next day Sylvia and Mrs. Gainsborough set out on the return journey to Tangier, which, apart from a disastrous attempt by Mrs. Gainsborough to eat a prickly pear, lacked incident.
“Let sleeping pears lie,” said Sylvia.
“Well, you don’t expect a fruit to be so savage,” retorted Mrs. Gainsborough. “I thought I must have aggravated a wasp. Talk about nettles. They’re chammy leather beside them. Prickly pears! I suppose the next thing I try to eat will be stabbing apples.”
They went home by Gibraltar, where Mrs. Gainsborough was delighted to see English soldiers.
“It’s nice to know we’ve got our eyes open even in Spain. I reckon I’ll get a good cup of tea here.”
They reached England at the end of April, and Sylvia decided to stay for a while at Mulberry Cottage. Reading through The Stage, she found that Jack Airdale was resting at Richmond in his old rooms, and went down to see him. He was looking somewhat thin and worried.
“Had rather a rotten winter,” he told her. “I got ill with a quinsey and had to throw up a decent shop, and somehow or other I haven’t managed to get another one yet.”
“Look here, old son,” Sylvia said, “I don’t want any damned pride from you. I’ve got plenty of money at present. You’ve got to borrow fifty pounds. You want feeding up and fitting out. Don’t be a cad now, and refuse a ‘lidy.’ Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! You know me by this time. Who’s going to be more angry, you at being lent money or me at being refused by one of the few, the very few, mark you, good pals I’ve got? Don’t be a beast, Jack. You’ve got to take it.”
He surrendered, from habit. Sylvia gave him all her news, but the item that interested him most was her having half taken up the stage.