She felt for Appleby a quiet esteem and a kindliness which just stopped short of tenderness. She was an American, and could hold her own with most men in the art of flirtation, but she was also capable of a camaraderie that was characterized by frank sincerity and untainted by any affectation of love-making for one of the opposite sex. That being so, she felt it was incumbent upon her to discharge the obligation she owed him if opportunity afforded, though she knew that the indiscreet meddler not infrequently involves in disaster those she would benefit. By and by there was a step behind her, and she saw Hester Earle regarding her with a twinkle in her eyes.
“If there had been anybody else to see you—Tony Palliser, for example—one could almost have fancied you had assumed that becomingly pensive pose,” she said. “You would make a picture of ingenuous contemplation.”
Nettie laughed. “Well,” she said, “I feel very like a torpedo. Anyway, I didn’t put it on, though I’m open to admit that there’s quite a trace of the peacock about me.”
“That is evidently American hyperbole,” said Hester. “Talk English, Nettie. I don’t understand.”
She seated herself on the mossy wall close by, and noticed that her companion was meditatively watching two figures approaching by a path through a wheatfield. They were just recognizable as Tony and Violet Wayne, and were evidently unaware of being observed, for the man stooped, and, plucking what appeared to be a poppy from among the corn, offered it to his companion. The pair stopped a moment, and the man seemed to be desirous of fastening it in the girl’s dress.
“The peacock,” said Nettie in the drawl she assumed only when it suited her, “is easy. They’re vain, you know, and I wouldn’t figure it was worth while to spread out my best tail before men like Tony Palliser. I’m quite fond of being looked at, too.”
“One would fancy you could scarcely find fault with him on that account,” said Hester dryly. “But the torpedo?”
“That’s a little harder. I suppose you never felt as if you were full of explosives, and could go off when you wanted and scatter destruction around. A torpedo doesn’t appear a very terrible thing, you know. It’s nice and round and shiny. I’ve seen one. Julian showed it me.”
“Nobody goes off in England—at least not among the people we care to mix with,” said Hester. “We send those who seem inclined to behave in that fashion out to the colonies or America. People appear to rather like explosions there.”
“Still, you must get a little shake up now and then. Did nothing startling and unexpected ever happen at Northrop?”