"I don't know what you generally smoke," he said. "Will you try one of these? It's a hot night. We may as well have coffee in the garden."
He seemed possessed with a spirit of restlessness, just as he had been on that night at the Casino in the spring. Crowther, massive and self-contained, observed him silently.
They went out on to the terrace, and drank their coffee in the dewy stillness. But even there Piers could not sit still. He prowled to and fro eternally, till Crowther set down his cup and joined him, pushing a quiet hand through his arm.
"It's a lovely place you've got here, sonny," he said; "a regular garden of Paradise. I almost envy you."
"Oh, you needn't do that. There's a serpent in every Eden," said Piers, with a mirthless laugh.
He did not seek to keep Crowther at arm's length, but neither did he seem inclined for any closer intimacy. His attitude neither invited nor repelled confidence. Yet Crowther knew intuitively that his very indifference was in itself a barrier that might well prove insurmountable.
He walked in silence while Piers talked intermittently of various impersonal matters, drifting at length into silence himself.
In the western wing of the house a light burned at an upper window, and Crowther, still quietly observant, noted how at each turn Piers' eyes went to that light as though drawn by some magnetic force.
Gently at length he spoke. "She doesn't look altogether robust, sonny."
Piers started sharply as if something had pricked him. "What? Avery do you mean? No, she isn't over and above strong—just now."