"Let us go as far as the fountain in the lower garden," says Olga: "it is always beautiful there when the moon is up."
"Avoid the grass, however; wet feet are dangerous," says Lord Rossmoyne, carefully.
"You will die an old bachelor," retorts Olga, saucily, "if you take so much 'thought for the morrow.'"
"It will certainly not be my fault if I do," returns Rossmoyne, calmly, but with evident meaning.
"Mrs. Bohun, bring your guitar," says Desmond, "and we will make Ronayne sing to it, and so imagine ourselves presently in the land of the olive and the palm."
"Shall we ask the others to come with us?" says Monica, kindly, glancing back into the drawing-room.
"Miss Browne, for example," suggests Owen Kelly. If he hopes by this speech to arouse jealousy in anybody present, he finds himself, later on, mightily mistaken.
"If she is as good a sort as you say, I daresay she would like it," says Olga. "And, besides, if we leave her to Bella's tender mercies she will undoubtedly be done to death by the time we return."
"Oh, do go and rescue her," says Mrs. Herrick, turning to Kelly. Her tone is almost appealing.
"Perhaps Miss Fitzgerald will come too," says Monica, somewhat fearfully.