Since the Vicar was a vegetarian and a pacifist this remark was not a happy one, and he drew back, disappointed and perturbed. His wife, always his champion, bucklering him against the world with a kind of fierce protectiveness, at once entered into the discussion and said across the table: "We do not all consider it folly to disapprove of bloodshed, I can assure you, Miss de Silva. A great many people today consider all bloodshed to be wrong."
"In my country," said Lola, applying herself to her soup, "we do not think that."
"Lola is a Mexican, you know," confided Geoffrey, seated next to Mrs. Chudleigh.
"A Mexican!" echoed Mrs. Chudleigh. "Oh, dear me! Of course that would account for it. Such a dreadful country! One feels that something ought to be done about it, but then they're all Roman Catholics, aren't they? And so Miss de Silva is a dancer, I think you said? On the stage, of course? Well, I always say it takes all sorts to make a world, and I hope I am sufficiently broad-minded… I see you have Mr. Guest staying with you again. He is quite a frequent visitor, is he not?"
Fay, overhearing this remark, coloured faintly, and lost the thread of the Vicar's painstaking conversation. Beyond him Lola was recounting the tale of her triumphs to Francis, while Camilla Halliday, seated on his left, sought doggedly to capture his attention. The General addressed himself solely to Mrs. Twining and Mrs. Chudleigh, but occasionally sent a smouldering look down the table towards Lola. Stephen Guest said nothing in particular; Geoffrey listened in adoring silence to what Lola was saying to his cousin, and Dinah pursued a futile conversation with Basil Halliday.
It was not a comfortable dinner-party, and at times it was in danger of becoming quite cataclysmic, as, for instance, when Lola produced a tiny Russian cigarette between the entree and the bird, and requested Francis to light it for her. The General looked daggers at his wife, and since she felt herself powerless to intervene, began to say in his most unpleasant voice: "Would you have the goodness to refrain —"
"A foreign custom, my dear Arthur," interposed Mrs. Twining, and took her own case out of her bag. Under her host's astonished glare she drew out a cigarette, and placed it between her lips. "A match, please," she said calmly.
"What the devil's the matter with you, Julia?" demanded Sir Arthur. "Since when have you taken to that disgusting habit?"
She raised her brows. "You ought to know by now that I am eminently adaptable," she said. "Ah, thank you, Mr. Guest. So kind of you."
Mrs. Chudleigh gave a shrill laugh. "I must say I did not expect to see you smoking at table, Julia," she remarked. "We live and learn. I wonder what Hilary would have to say to me if I were suddenly to light a cigarette in the middle of dinner?"