They bade each other good-night.
"I'll have a look in the solicitor's office all the same," said Gaston to himself.
CHAPTER X
HE COMES TO "THE WAKING OF THE FIRE"
A few days afterwards Gaston joined a small party at Peppingham. Without any accent life was made easy for him. He was alone much, and yet, to himself, he seemed to have enough of company.
The situation did not impose itself conspicuously. Delia gave him no especial reason to be vain. She had not an exceeding wit, but she had charm, and her talk was interesting to Gaston, who had come, for the first time, into somewhat intimate relations with an English girl. He was struck with her conventional delicacy and honour on one side, and the limitation of her ideas on the other. But with it all she had some slight touch of temperament which lifted her from the usual level. And just now her sprightliness was more marked than it had ever been.
Her great hour seemed come to her. She knew that there had been talk among the elders, and what was meant by Gaston's visit. Still, they were not much alone together. Gaston saw her mostly with others. Even a woman with a tender strain for a man knows what will serve for her ascendancy: the graciousness of her disposition, the occasional flash of her mother's temper, and her sense of being superior to a situation—the gift of every well-bred English girl.
Cluny Vosse was also at the house, and his devotion was divided between Delia and Gaston. Cluny was a great favourite, and Agatha Gasgoyne, who had a wild sense of humour, egged him on with her sister, which gave Delia enough to do. At last Cluny, in a burst of confidence, declared that he meant to propose to Delia. Agatha then became serious, and said that Delia was at least four years older than himself, that he was just her—Agatha's—age, and that the other match would be very unsuitable. This put Cluny on Delia's defence, and he praised her youth, and hinted at his own elderliness. He had lived, he had seen It (Cluny called the world and all therein "It"), he was aged; he was in the large eye of experience; he had outlived the vices and the virtues of his time, which, told in his own naive staccato phrases, made Agatha hug herself. She advised him to go and ask Mr. Belward's advice; begged him not to act until he had done so. And Cluny, who was blind as a bat when a woman mocked him, went to Gaston and said:
"See, old chap,—I know you don't mind my calling you that—I've come for advice. Agatha said I'd better. A fellow comes to a time when he says, 'Here, I want a shop of my own,' doesn't he? He's seen It, he's had It all colours, he's ready for family duties, and the rest. That's so, isn't it?"
Gaston choked back a laugh, and, purposely putting himself on the wrong scent, said: