A peacock, tail unfurled, minced colorfully toward us, down the white pathway.
"To keep her good!" I repeated scornfully, "with whipping?"
"I'm not advocating it," he answered quickly, "but his motives are unquestionably admirable. And there's a Spanish proverb, you may recall—it runs, tersely, 'A woman, a dog, and a chestnut-tree, the more you beat them, the better they be!'"
Wiggles, his eyes on the stately departing peacock, pranced down the path toward us, and, deflected by my whistle from his original, doubtless destructive purpose, leaped gaily at my ruffles.
"Did you hear that, Wiggles?" I asked him. "This is decidedly no place for you!"
But Wiggles, rolling happily in the grass, merely snorted.
A gong sounded from the house, and we went in to lunch.
About two o'clock, I was attacked by an overpowering languor. Twice, no less, I yawned in Peter's face, in the midst of his thrilling description of "babies an' ladies an' gentlemen, all brown, Aunt Mavis!"
"Siesta, now!" remarked my husband briskly. "Both of you! Off to bed!"
"Bed!" I said, "in the middle of the day!" Peter, but recently released from the burden of an afternoon nap, protested.