Peggy hurried across the lawn as Edith came to meet her.
“And listeners—were you listening?—do hear good of themselves sometimes,” she said. “As if you could ever hear otherwise! Oh, Edith, what a divine night!”
Yet this sudden interruption was no jar to Edith; here was the human voice speaking as kindly and as sincerely as the nightingale. The world was not complete without its men and women.
“I am late,” went on Peggy; “but it was really Hugh’s fault, who is later. You don’t know him, do you? But his name is Mr. Grainger, and he was playing wild Indians with the children, and told them a fairy-story, the end of which I heard, which had no sense whatever in it, and was quite divine. Yes, we won’t think of waiting for him. It would make him feel so strange.”
Lord Rye followed his wife out, and the three of them sat down. He was a small, neat man, of extraordinary placidity, who regarded his wife rather as some philosophical citizen may regard a meteor that crosses the sky above his garden. He never ceased to admire and wonder at her, and it always seemed to him that her crossing over his own sky, so to speak, was an act of great friendliness on her part. He often looked up and wondered vaguely how fast she travelled, for the spectacle of her speed filled him with gentle mathematical pleasure at the thought of the pace she was going. He knew too that the sky-streaking meteor never failed to come home; that for all her lightning expeditions, she dropped there, to her husband and children. Naturally, also, she played about with other meteors, of whom was Hugh Grainger. He, too, lay about in hayfields and told the children fairy-stories, which they repeated to their father. In fact, there was never a couple who were so right in both liking and loving each other.
“I see that the Government majority on the fifth clause of the Education Bill—” began Toby, when he had received his soup.
“Oh, Toby, don’t!” said his wife.
“Very well,” said Lord Rye, and took up his spoon.
“Oh, you darling!” said Peggy. “Edith, isn’t he a darling? Tell him so.”
Edith looked gravely at her brother-in-law.