“Astonishingly warm for January. You find it so? So do I. Yes, you really notice it?”
“I have been thinking over it since I got up,” said Isabel. “I wonder how many degrees we have in this room?”
With the delight of a shy man who has found something definite to speak of, Colonel Stratton at once started up to go to the thermometer which hung in the window; a half-suppressed laugh made him stop and turn round.
“You don’t really care to know,” he said, flushing up to the eyes. “That’s one of your jokes, Mrs. Clarendon. Ha, ha! Good!”
He stood before her, desperately nibbling both ends of his moustache—he had acquired much skill in the habit of getting them both into his mouth at the same time.
“Well, colonel?”
“You are in a—a frisky mood this morning, Mrs. Clarendon,” he burst forth, laughing painfully.
“A what kind of mood?”
“I beg your pardon. I should have chosen a better word,” he exclaimed, in much confusion. “It really is wonderfully warm for the season—you notice it?”
“Colonel, I assure you I notice it.”