Nine rang from a dock-tower or two as he jubilantly received coffee from the large silver-service at which Miss Geraldine Wells presided.
“Jerry!” he cried joyfully. “It’s done. The Rubicon is crossed and the Atlantic is not! We’ll hunt up one of those Woman’s League places right after dinner.”
“No,” she corrected; “not immediately. My conscience is York State and peculiar. You’ll have to drive me down to the boat-landing, so that I can say truthfully that I went there, but it was too late.”
“That is rural!” he laughed. “My conscience is strictly urban, like a steel bridge; it’s built to stand an awful strain.”
Jollity came out upon him. He grew witty, quick of tongue, even appreciative of the woman before him. He called her “Jerry” as if he liked the name; he did not resent her occasional “my dear.” His vacation had been suddenly lengthened; he was like a child in his unaffected glee; while the lady grew demurer and demurer, to use the language of “Wonderland.”
The rural conscience of Miss Geraldine Wells was insistent. It demanded precedence over hunts for Woman’s League pensions; and it would not walk, it would go in a cab. What if the distance is short and cabs cost money? Isn’t a satisfied conscience above rubies?
Not that Mr. Richard objected to the most freakish demands of Miss Geraldine’s York State conscience; on the contrary, he was most interested in it; it was one more curious phenomenon of the most curious of all phenomena, namely Life itself. He dealt with it—on the rumbling ride along the docks—both seriously and humorously. In fact, he was in the midst of a rather good joke on the moral iniquity of consciences in general when the vehicle stopped abruptly near the front end of a familiar black hulk on which a string of striking white letters proclaimed, “S.S. Victoria.”
“Play’s over,” a laughing voice whispered in his ear. “Wake up, child, and come on home.”
But he did not wake up. He stared stupidly and tried to get his bearings.
“She sails to-morrow at six, Sir Richard,” the lady explained, again demurely; “not to-night at nine as you so foolishly believed.”