"I think it is very kind of him," she said judicially, in reply to Mrs. Cameron's rapture over the laird's condescension; "but Peter Morrison will be furious at having his show spoilt. And he has amputated the poor things at the knee. Men ought never to pick flowers, they don't understand them, except gardeners, and they never want to pick them at all."
When she went up that afternoon to the Big House in order to aid Mrs. Cameron's taste in the matter of new curtains, there was a little bunch of white heather and stag-horn moss tucked into her belt. In finding room amongst the vases for the newcomers this had seemed too pretty to throw away, that was all. But Paul Macleod's keen eyes fell on it at once with a certain satisfaction; nevertheless, he made no allusion to the subject, a reticence which he would not have observed towards most women of his acquaintance. It was sufficient for him to be aware of its complicated history. That sort of thing gave an infinite zest to life.
[CHAPTER VI.]
Even in the dusty glare of a dusty July sun, one of the largest houses in Queen's Gardens looked cool and pleasant with its delicate shades of grey on wall and portico, its striped jalousies and tiled window gardens gay with scarlet geraniums, yellow calceolarias, and blue lobelias; flowers, all of them, which seem somehow to have lost their flowerfulness by being so constantly associated in one's mind with area railings, barrel organs, and the eternal rat-tat of the postman's knock--to be brief, with London. For all the passer-by knew or cared, those lines of brilliant red, yellow, and blue blossoms might have been cunningly composed of paper, and would have served their purpose to the full as well had they been so, since no one, even inside the house, ever looked on them in the light of living, breathing plants going through a process of asphyxiation. It is difficult no doubt to resist the temptation to have pot-plants in London, but how often when brought face to face with the hideous ravages which a day or two of its poisonous atmosphere makes on our favourites has not the true flower-lover felt nothing short of murder. The inhabitants of the house in Queen's Gardens, however, had not even this chance for remorse, since the boxes were kept bright by contract, and if any poor plant was ill-advised enough to droop and complain, it was promptly rooted up and replaced by the man who came in the early mornings to "walk the hospitals" before the family appeared on the scene.
Within the house, the same spick and span, utterly impersonal attention to beauty prevailed. From basement to attic it was simply perfect in its appointments. As it might well be, since an artist in copper utensils had been let loose in the kitchen, the greatest authority in the world on wall papers had been allowed his will in friezes and dados; and so on from cellar to roof. There is, of course, a good deal to be said in favour of this modern specialism. It is distinctly comforting to know, that if you have not reached perfection, you have at any rate paid for it; but to some barbarians the loss of individuality in such houses is very grievous. To begin with, you lose a most delightful study of character. And after all, if Mrs. Jones has a sneaking admiration for a pea-green carpet with pink cabbage roses sprinkled over it, why, in heaven's name, should she conceal the fact? No green that ever was dyed is greener than grass, no flower that ever was woven is half as brilliant as the blossom-mosaic which Nature spreads for you to tread upon when the snow melts from the upland Alps. Yet the house was charming enough in detail if a little confusing en masse to those sensitive to their surroundings; since the drawing-room was Queen Anne, the dining-room Tudor, and various other corridors and apartments Japanesque, Renaissance, Early English, or Pompeian.
This again did not affect the inmates, who, indeed, would have scorned to feel as if time and space had been annihilated in the course of half-a-dozen steps; such fanciful imaginations being almost wicked, when time and space were distinctly necessary to the due performance of your duty in that state of life to which it had pleased Providence to call you.
On this particular morning in July, Mr. and Mrs. Woodward and their daughter Alice were seated at the breakfast table in the usual comfortable indifferent silence of people who keep a diary of outside engagements in a conspicuous place on the writing-table, and whose inner lives move in decorous procession from morn till eve. A canary was singing joyfully, but at the same time keeping a watchful eye on the grey Persian cat which walked up and down rubbing itself, as it passed and repassed, against Mrs. Woodward's gown, with an anxious look on the bread and milk she was crumbling for it. Mr. Woodward, at the other side of a central palm tree, studied the share list. Miss Alice Woodward, who had evidently come down later than the others, was still engaged listlessly on toast and butter; finally making a remark in an undertone to her mother that as Jack had settled to ride with her in the Park at eleven, she supposed it was about time to get ready; a remark which resulted in her pushing away her plate languidly.
"You have eaten no breakfast, my dear, and you are looking pale," said her mother, comfortably; "I will get you some more Blaud's from the Stores."
"Oh! I'm all right," replied the girl. "It's hot, and--and things are tiresome. They generally are at the end of the season, aren't they?"
She drifted easily, rather aimlessly, out of the room. Like everything else in the house she was costly and refined; pretty in herself but without any individuality. For the rest, blonde and graceful, with a faintly discontented droop of the mouth, and large, full, china-blue eyes.