Edward had hardly adjusted the situation before she came out—and he felt the sight of her was worth waiting for. She wore now a white coat with touches of black velvet, and the hat was white, too, with black and a pink rose or two.
"It looks more like Bond Street than Peckham," he said as she got in. "It surpasses my wildest dreams."
"I had to make them trim it," she said, "that's why I was such ages. All the ones they had were like Madge Wildfire—insane, wild, unrelated feathers and bows born in Bedlam."
Her eyes, under the brim of the new hat, thrilled him, and when Charles, leaping on her lap, knocked the hat crooked, scattered the mound of parcels, and made rosetted dust-marks on the new cloak, her reception of these clumsy advances would have endeared her to any one to whom she was not already dear.
"Well," she said, tucking Charles in between them, setting the hat straight, and dusting the coat, all in one competent movement, "have you had time yet to think what you're going to do with me?"
"I have had time," he said, rearranging the mound.
"I'm so sorry I was so long, but. . . ."
"It was worth it," he said, looking at the hat. "Well, what I propose is that you should go, not to Claridge's, which is just the place where your relations will look for you, but to one of those large, comfortable hotels where strictly middle-class people stay when they come up to London on matters connected with their shops or their farms. I will give you as long as you like to unpack your new portmanteau and your parcels. Then I'll call for you and take you out to dinner."
"But I thought we were going on tramp," she objected.