‘You, gentlemen, I dare say will be wicked enough to smoke,’ remarked Mrs. Waltham, as she rose from the table.
‘I tell you what we shall be wicked enough to do, mother,’ exclaimed Alfred. ‘We shall have two cups of coffee brought out into the garden, and spare your furniture!’
‘Very well, my son. Your two cups evidently mean that Adela and I are not invited to the garden.’
‘Nothing of the kind. But I know you always go to sleep, and Adela doesn’t like tobacco smoke.’
‘I go to sleep, Alfred! You know very well that I have a very different occupation for my Sunday afternoons.’
‘I really don’t care anything about smoking,’ observed Mutimer, with a glance at Adela.
‘Oh, you certainly shall not deprive yourself on my account, Mr. Mutimer,’ said the girl, good-naturedly. ‘I hope soon to come out into the garden, and I am not at all sure that my objection to tobacco is serious.’
Ah, if Mrs. Mewling could have heard that speech! Mrs. Mewling’s age was something less than fifty; probably she had had time to forget how a young girl such as Adela speaks in pure frankness and never looks back to muse over a double meaning.
It was nearly three o’clock. Adela compared her watch with the sitting-room clock, and, the gentlemen having retired, moved about the room with a look of uneasiness. Her mother stood at the window, seemingly regarding the sky, in reality occupying her thoughts with things much nearer. She turned and found Adela looking at her.
‘I want just to run over and speak to Letty,’ Adela said. ‘I shall very soon be back.’