“You’re dreaming, Mrs. Lewin!”
For once Chum’s control of her blood failed her, and she flushed a little, conscious that he told the truth. Her thoughts were with Gregory and his probable prudence in turning back.
“It was appropriate, anyhow!” she retorted, shaking a huge specimen off her skirts. “That’s not a tarantula, is it?”
“No; common or garden bug, I think. Let’s put it on Miss Denver’s shoulder and hear her scream!”
“No, Captain Nugent! Stop!” A sharp memory of the hysterical quality of Miss Denver’s cry on the hillside made Chum the more imperious. Even in her own mind she did not form the fear that a very little would upset the girl’s balance to make men suspicious of she knew not what; all she felt was that Miss Denver was not in a state of nerves for the endurance of spiders. There might be nothing in it, but she remembered with faint disgust Major Churton’s broad comment, “She has the worried look of a girl who has been kissed.” Mrs. Lewin dropped the subject, and the spider together, with distaste. Her mental attitude grew a little contemptuous.
The next instant she had risen silently to her feet with a nearer and more bitter interest. Some one had said, “Have a cého, Ally?”—and she threaded her way through the chattering crowd round the table-cloth to the three men standing apart by the tethered ponies, without haste, and with a complete appearance of her errand being her own need.
“Ally, do get me some soda-water!” said her voice behind her husband, as he vacillated on the brink of consent. “I can’t wait for our meal to be ready, I’m so thirsty. And don’t put anything but ice into it; it’s too hot.”
Her candid eyes met his without a shadow of reproach; yet he coloured ever so slightly, and shook his head at the man who had suggested cého. As he halved the soda-water between them, Chum felt the old humiliation sweep back over her with fresh force. Who was she to think herself and Ally above these neighbours of theirs? With this ugly possibility always dodging her steps, she was a woman who dared not leave her husband to judge for himself, but was forced to risk an interference that might be rightly interpreted at any moment! She stood there in dispirited silence, beautiful in her summer gown, but with earnest eyes that seemed out of place above the dainty muslin; and for one mad moment she could have cursed the weakness of the man beside her which had spoiled her ideal.
And it was just as she turned from him to save suspicion of her errand, that a sound of welcome arose from the group round the table-cloth.
“When did you turn up?”—“How wet you are? You must have swum the stream!”—“There’s a compliment for you, Mrs. Gilderoy—nothing would keep him away!”—“Well, you always were a man who surmounted difficulties!”