"I should like you, my dear, to leave us together this evening," said he.
Mrs. Wedmore jumped up at once, gathering her balls of wool and big knitting-needles together with one quick sweep of the arm.
"All right, dear," said she, with another nod, giving him an anxious look.
Mr. Wedmore perceived the look and smiled. He stretched out his hand to lay it gently on his wife's arm as she passed him.
"Nothing about me. Nothing for you to be alarmed about," said he.
Mrs. Wedmore hesitated a moment. She had her suspicions, and she would dearly have liked to know more. But she was the best trained of wives; and after a moment's pause, seeing that she was to hear nothing further, she said, good-humoredly: "All right, dear," and left the room, just in time to shake hands with Doctor Haselden as she went out.
Now, while the host found it impossible to shake off the signs of his old calling, the doctor was a man who had never been able to assume them. From head to foot there was no trace of the doctor in his appearance; he looked all over what at heart he was—the burly, good-humored, home-loving, land-loving country gentleman, who looked upon Great Datton, where his home was, as the pivot of the world.
However he was dressed, he always looked shabby, and he could never have been mistaken for anything but an English gentleman.
He shook hands with Mr. Wedmore, with a smile. These poor Londoners, trying to acclimatize themselves, amused him greatly. He looked upon them much as the Londoner looks upon the Polish Jew immigrants—with pity, a little jealousy, and no little scorn.
"Where's Carlo?" asked he.