“A Happy New Year to you.”
He stopped, swung round, and laughed.
“I thought you wouldn’t have known me,” he said.
“What, is it you George?” cried Lettie in great surprise—“Now, what a joke! How are you?”—she put out her white hand from her draperies. He took it, and answered, “I am very well—and you—?” However meaningless the words were, the tone was curiously friendly, intimate, informal.
“As you see,” she replied laughing, interested in his attitude—“but where are you going?”
“I am going home,” he answered, in a voice that meant “have you forgotten that I too am married?”
“Oh, of course!” cried Lettie. “You are now mine host of the Ram. You must tell me about it. May I ask him to come home with us for an hour, mother?—It is New Year’s Eve, you know.”
“You have asked him already,” laughed mother.
“Will Mrs. Saxton spare you for so long?” asked Lettie of George.
“Meg? Oh, she does not order my comings and goings.”