They were sitting on the bank of the river below the Clivedon woods, a little apart from the others, and she felt that as he had behaved so well, she owed him some apology.
"It was very nice of you, Mr. Broxton," she said, "to be so polite to me last night. To tell you the truth, I did know you, though you didn't know me. I was an old friend of your mother's, but I hadn't time to explain that, and you were good enough to take me without explanations. I always wonder what our attitude towards old friends of our mothers ought to be. I really don't see why they should have any claim upon one."
Jack laughed.
"The fact was that I knew you were right as soon as you spoke to me, though I wanted to resent it. I had been putting it differently to myself; that was why I spoke to Dodo."
"Tell me more," she said. "From the momentary glance I had of you and her, I thought you had been remonstrating with her, and she had been objecting. I don't blame you for remonstrating in the general way. Dodo's conduct used not to be always blameless. But it looked private, and that was what I did object to. I daresay you think me a tiresome, impertinent, old woman."
Jack felt more strongly than ever that this woman could not help being well-bred in whatever she did.
"It sounds disloyal to one's friends, I know," he said, "but it was because I really did care for both of them that I acted as I did. What will happen will be that he will continue to adore her, and by degrees she will begin to hate him. He will not commit suicide, and I don't think Dodo will make a scandal. Her regard for appearances alone would prevent that. It would be a confession of failure."
Mrs. Vivian looked grave.
"Did you tell Dodo this?"
"More or less," he replied. "Except about the scandal and the suicide."