Mrs. Compton laughed.
"I can manage that in my head. Eighty pounds would be about your income."
"Lawks a-mercy!" said Mrs. Smithers under her breath. She brooded over this information for a minute, in which her companion became aware that Sigrid was speaking again—very quietly. If she had spoken angrily Mary Compton would not have felt her heart beating against her ribs in an absurd, horrible excitement. "It's amazing what a little a lot of money is," Mrs. Smithers philosophized gloomily. "I've done a powerful lot of saving, and two thousand pounds seems a powerful lot to have saved, but what's eighty pounds a year? A mere drop in an ocean. One couldn't keep oneself in boots and shoes with it."
Mrs. Compton stared. Mrs. Smithers's elastic-sided foot-gear did not suggest eighty pounds' expenditure, or anything like it.
"No—I suppose not," she ventured.
"And two thousand pounds, for that matter," Mrs. Smithers continued, with increased contempt. "What's the good of that? One couldn't live decently for six months on it."
"I could," Mrs. Compton assured her with a smouldering twinkle in her bright eyes; "but, of course, I'm different. I say, Smithy, are you going on the bust—painting Gaya red and that sort of thing? Do include me in the invitation if you are. I'd just love to do something outrageous." But Mrs. Smithers remained coldly unresponsive, and she got up with a sigh of discomfort. "Well, I'm off. I can't stand that man's voice, and I don't want to see him again. Tell Sigrid I've been, and implore her to come round to dinner. Archie and I are bored stiff with each other." She paused on the edge of the verandah, driving the point of her parasol in between the flags and becoming violently slangy. "I say, Smithy dear, you know I look upon you as a sort of guardian angel to Sigrid. I just wanted to say—if there's anything wrong—any one who's in need of a kicking or—or anything of that kind—or, in fact, if Sigrid wants a body-guard physically or otherwise—just drop us the wink. Archie and I are on."
She was blushing hotly. Mrs. Smithers cleared her throat.
"I shall certainly drop you the wink," she said, in her best manner.
Mrs. Compton nodded, opened her parasol, and set out to face the stretch of hot road back to her own bungalow.