"Does it, I am so glad," said Dolly.
"Yes, you seem perfectly incapable of saying one word to each other without chaffing."
Old Mr. Darche had finished his oysters.
"Yes—yes," he observed. "A pair of chaffinches."
A moment of silence followed this appalling pun. Then Mrs. Darche laughed a little nervously, and Brett, who wished to help her, followed her example. The old gentleman himself seemed delighted with his own wit.
"We are beginning well," said Dolly. "Puns and proverbs with the oysters. What shall we get with the fruit?"
Vanbrugh was inclined to suggest that the dessert would probably find them in an idiot asylum, but he wisely abstained from words and tried to turn the conversation into a definite channel.
"Did you read that book I sent you, Mrs. Darche?" he asked.
"Yes," answered the latter, "I began to read it to my father-in-law but he did not care for it, so I am going on with it alone."
"What book was that, my dear?" inquired the old gentleman.