"How hopelessly old-fashioned you are, Big Bear! I don't believe you will ever learn to shave yourself in tufts, and become a civilized poodle. Of course he likes her. She is really a very nice girl, and then she only has a father. Don't you think the American 'par-par' is less objectionable as a rule than the 'mar-mar'? To be serious,--which I should not trouble to be with ninety-nine people out of a hundred,--Eustace and I have seen the error of our ways, and we intend--in fact, I personally expect to be very happy. As I said, Louisa is very--"
"Where do you spend the honeymoon?" he interrupted, not being in the least interested in Louisa's part in the business.
"Again hopelessly old-fashioned! There is but one place, nowadays, in which to spend a honeymoon,--Paris. It is so full of distractions. Then Mr. Wilson has taken a grouse moor near the North Pole; Eustace is to come there in his new yacht, and we are to have a real good time; as Louisa--"
"Near the North Pole? Didn't know grouse grew there."
"Well, it is not very far from it. I forget the name,--but see! there is Eustace behind old Lady Brecknock's feathers. He will remember."
A very handsome dark man in the stream saw her signal and drifted sideways to shelter.
"Charity cometh," he began.
"Please not. Mr. Lockhart has patented it already; besides, I want you to tell me the name of that place in the Hebrides. Roederay! Yes, of course! I remember now that it put me in mind of dry champagne. By the way, you used to paint that coast once, Mr. Lockhart; do you by chance know Roederay?"
What is called a flicker of expression crossed her hearer's face. It is a poor description for the absolute blank which a chance word brings to some imaginative people by summoning them from the present into the past.
"I know it well," he replied. "And if you will excuse me, Lady Maud, I don't think it has much in common with dry champagne."