"The punkah-coolie had a nap instead. It was so hot—oh, Smithy, what an annoying person you can be! I've been hunting for you for the last hour."
"In which case," Mrs. Smithers commented, with a judicial flavour of speech culled from the law reports, "you must have looked under all the chairs and tables. I can't see how anybody could hunt for anything in this nasty barn of a place without running into them in ten minutes. Not a decent door, not a corner where you can get a moment to yourself—let alone escape from those crawling black things——"
Sigrid Fersen sighed. She had been standing in the doorway, one slender arm, from which the sleeve of her pale green tea-gown had dropped back, raised to hold aside the curtain. Now she came forward, moving restlessly and noiselessly about the room, picking up one ornament after another and putting it down without apparently having looked at it.
"You never will let me wipe my boots on you, Smithy," she complained. "I've trained you to be a doormat ever since I was an infant in arms, and you still show not the slightest aptitude. One of these days, I shall lose patience and send you flying." She caught the line of contempt at the corner of Mrs. Smithers's prim mouth and came over and pinched her ear with real severity. "I saw that sneer, you horrid, disreputable old tyrant! You think I can't get on without you. I wish I could, just to spite you——"
She stopped short, as though losing interest in her train of thought, and stood at Mrs. Smithers's side stroking the latter's withered cheek with a light, absent-minded hand. Mrs. Smithers accepted the attention much as a cat would have done, without gush or undignified gratitude, but with sedate I-fully-deserve-it satisfaction. "Smithy, do you realize that we shall have to pack up soon?"
"And a very good thing, too. A nice sight you're getting to look in this oven of a place."
"Am I? I thought so myself this afternoon. It quite frightened me. Smithy, make an effort and tell the truth. Am I showing signs of—of wear and tear?"
Mrs. Smithers unbent. She took the hand on her shoulder and kissed it abruptly and shamefacedly.
"Steel doesn't rust, Sigrid."
"Doesn't it? That shows what you know about steel. Also it proves you've been reading penny novelettes again. Still, there is such a thing as poetic licence, and as a compliment it will pass. No, I shan't rust, Smithy—I'd rather snap like the good blade of your metaphor——" She drifted along the currents of her thoughts for a moment, and then added abruptly, "So it's hey for England and the end of things."