Once a Sawney always a Sawney. Perennially, it seemed, was she up against the relentless workings of that natural law. Marriage, money, commonsense, the really big things of life, meant so little to him compared with windmills and myrtles, and things of that kind. Like her beloved Miss Babraham, this dear and charming fellow was almost too good to be true, but day by day the conviction was growing upon her that he really did need somebody practical to look after him. And she was not alone in thinking so. Miss Babraham, who knew so much about everything, had already expressed that opinion to her quite strongly.
Here he was, in the middle of a perfect morning, with all sorts of really beautiful things about him, and larks and blackbirds quiring, and the sun on the water and the Surrey hills, wasting his time seemingly, by drawing that rather paltry looking little plant stuck up there on the top of the Hoodoo. Even if it was the emblem of marriage she could not help a subtle feeling of annoyance that he should not use his precious time a bit better.
However, the cream of the joke was to follow.
The artist it was who quaintly burst this fresh bubble of silence. “Talk as much as you like, Miss June,” he said with something a little odd, a little unexpected in his manner, “but I hope you’ll keep your hands in your lap just as they are now, and if you don’t mind will you please bring your chin round a bit—on to a level with my finger.”
“Please get on with that myrtle.” Before, however, the fiat was really pronounced, she abruptly stopped. Could such a thing be? Was it possible that he was not drawing the myrtle at all?
It was more than possible.
And that was the cream of the whole matter!
LXIII
“I’m not half as good looking as that,” said June.
“All depends, don’t you know, on the angle at which one happens to get you,” said William.