A bit flustered, the hostess got hastily to her feet.
"So good of you to come—You know every one, don't you, Gregory? You'll have your tea here with us?" And below her breath, she added: "You mustn't be too hard on Andreyvitch, Gregory. These Russians—well, they're all a bit primitive."
He went from one to the other of the men. He kissed Kathleen's hand and told her how pretty she looked. He let Mrs. Broughton-Hollins pour his tea, and he ignored the Russian completely, the while he watched Kathleen with a strange foreboding, as her eyes flickered again and again over Andreyvitch's face.
Things did not go very smoothly during the next two days. Naturally they all did the usual. Golf and riding, bridge and dancing in the evenings, and shooting. Andreyvitch was passionately fond of shooting. Manners had never so much as killed a sparrow in all his life.
There was an undercurrent of uneasiness which permeated the entire household. It was not particularly because of Andreyvitch and Manners. It was something that not one of them could have explained if they had been put to it.
The first day Mrs. Galvin told her husband that she would be glad when it was all over. And although unexpressed that was the general sentiment.
Not that Andreyvitch or Manners made the others uncomfortable. After Gregory's first outburst, and now that they were under the same roof, it rather seemed that the Russian avoided Manners. And Manners—He watched carefully every movement, every little turn or twist of Andreyvitch's. At that time it was as if he were trying to substantiate some memory of his; to substantiate it deliberately and positively.
And then because of Andreyvitch's unceasing attentions to Kathleen Bennet, word went round among the various members of the house-party that Gregory and Kathleen had quarreled.
It was Sunday afternoon when Manners came upon Kathleen walking alone in the rose-garden.
"I'll be jolly well glad," he told her, "when we get back to town again."