'Thank you; it is very kind,' I answered rather coldly; 'and of course I shall be happy to come and see you to-morrow as usual if you will let me. But I couldn't spend the whole day at Oak Lodge, because, you see, I have guests to consider.'
'And can't they spare you for a single afternoon?' asked Lucy with a hard laugh. 'I shall really begin to feel quite jealous.'
'You need not indeed,' I broke out hastily and earnestly, 'I assure you——'
She interrupted me in a very abrupt and icy manner. 'Pray do not take the trouble. No man who was such a flimsy creature as to give me reason for jealousy could possibly retain a hold upon my affections.'
'Of course not,' I assented, in my usual mean-spirited way, but with a dawning suspicion that my fiancée's affections would not prove strong enough for even a less flimsy creature than I to obtain a firm grip on.
'My father and Mrs. Farington will drive over to-morrow,' Lucy went on; 'I believe they intend to ask Mrs. Scott to dinner. I suppose one must ask the mother too,' she added dubiously.
'It will certainly be better, unless you wish to insult them both,' I said in an unnaturally subdued tone the significance of which I think she failed to notice. 'But in any case the invitation will have no awful results, for Mrs. Scott is not well enough to go out to dinners.'
'Ah, poor thing, I suppose not. She looks very ill. It seems almost impossible to believe what they tell me, that she was once very pretty. Perhaps she would not look so bad though if somebody could only persuade her to dress like other people. Did you ever see anything like that shawl arrangement she had on when I first came?'
'Never,' said I calmly. 'But I confess I am barbarous enough to think that a merit. Every lady's style of dress should have something unique about it.'
'Indeed! Then how about mine?'