She dropped her handkerchief and as he stooped to pick it up a subdued groan came from him.
"I wonder what maniac ever devised such a shirt," he grumbled. "It's correct—the man told me so—showed me pictures to prove it ... but it proves that civilisation isn't civilised. Catch a savage in a straight jacket like this—I guess not."
There was a dreadful pause as she entered the library with Good. For a fleeting instant which seemed minutes to her, everyone stared at the newcomer. Then breeding reasserted itself and Judith was able to go through the introductions without further embarrassment. Good stumbled cheerfully over ladies' trains, shook hands vigorously, was uniformly "pleased to meet" everyone, and appeared quite unconscious of the interested, not to say amused gazes which followed him. But Judith could see plainly that he was not sorry when the process of acquainting him with the other guests was over and he could slip out of the conversational maelstrom into the quiet backwaters formed by the space between the piano and the wall, to stand alone in a contemplative and awkward silence. She was relieved, too, when dinner was announced.
She had been in doubt as to just where to place him at the table, but had finally decided on Molly Wolcott. She was a very animated girl, if the companion and the topic interested her, and extraordinarily taciturn if they did not. Her range of interests was not large, being chiefly concerned with the various ramifications of sport. She had once been known to turn with deliberation from a distinguished British novelist, to a callow youth whose sole claim to distinction lay in having kicked a winning goal.
Judith felt confident that Good would prove quite without attraction for her. But she would, for that very reason, leave him severely alone, and she could, herself, take care of him. With that in view, she had left her own avenues open, by seating at her left a young man whose concerns were almost exclusively gastronomic.
But, as usual, Good surprised her. Molly began, as was to be expected, by giving her partner a cursory examination, and then plunging unceremoniously into a heated discussion of the afternoon's golf, with Roger who sat across the table.
"That was the most inexcusable putt I ever hope to see," she declared.
"I was afraid of it," confessed Roger dejectedly. "That hole looked like the eye of a needle."
"You can't hole short putts without confidence," observed Ned Alder, who was a notoriously bad golfer. "Now I always...."
"Why don't you take a course of lessons in confidence?" asked Molly rudely.