That was fragmentary enough, undetached from any context, but Silvia found herself understanding him perfectly.
“My mother and Mr. Mainwaring arranged it,” she said. “I couldn’t very well say no, could I? Not that I wanted to; I don’t mean that.”
“My father’s delighted,” said Peter.
“He’s in great form,” he added. “You’ve delighted him. Aren’t we a weird family?”
There seemed no direct reply possible to this. Silvia could not imagine herself assenting, and it seemed banal as well as untrue to say, “No, you’re quite ordinary.” But she found herself not wanting and not even needing to reply at all. She wanted, and for that matter she needed no more than to have Peter there and be wonderfully happy. He shifted himself a little in his very low chair as he turned to get a match for his cigarette, and she again just found herself noticing little things about him. His fingers were very long and smooth, the nails very neatly sheathed in the skin that held them: they grew beautifully. Best of all was the short, closely-clipped hair which, when he bent his head forward towards the match, stopped just above his collar.
“You needn’t answer that,” he said. “Tell me, instead, what you thought of the play last night. Are people sentimental—girls particularly—like that when they are really moved? I should have thought that emotion killed sentimentality. But it may be different in Scotland.”
Peter, at the conclusion of this ridiculous speech, suddenly found himself in the dilemma of talking nonsense without the co-operation and backing of the person whom he was talking nonsense to. Silvia, at any rate, did not contribute any soap-bubbles of her own, and, quick to perceive that, he turned to his mother.
“What sort of hotels are there in Scotland, mother?” he asked. “Oh, I must explain to Miss Wardour. My mother loves reading the advertisements of hotels in Bradshaw. It gives her the sense of travel, doesn’t it, mother?”
He paused no more than infinitesimally and went on again in the same breath.