“And now for a good old pow wow.” He began to write her name on the grass with the tip of his cane. “You’re looking just a wee bit chippy, aren’t you? Air of Shropshire take some digesting, eh? My mother is a clinker, isn’t she? And Cousin Mildred. But their young lives are not exactly a beanfeast, what? And then the friends and neighbours. Did you meet the friends and neighbours?”
“Bushels.”
At the look on Mame’s shrewd and piquant countenance Bill cried “What ho!” in a fashion which startled a number of sparrows into sitting up and taking notice. “Then that funny old Dower House. I expect it rather gave you the pip.”
As a matter of fact the Dower House had rather given Mame the pip but it hardly seemed good manners to do so.
“Own up. Honest Injun.” Bill coolly surveyed the expressive countenance of Mame. “It always does me. But tell me, now, what do you think of the Towers? That’s a bit of a landmark, isn’t it?”
“Bully!” was Mame’s formula for the Towers. It didn’t quite express her feelings, but it seemed wise to keep to that inclusive simplicity.
“That’s the word,” Bill agreed.
Suddenly Mame took him up. “Bully isn’t at all the word for a place like the Towers.” To her own ear her voice grew harsh and strident. “It wants a better word than that. Doesn’t carry the meaning, that word. There’s an atmosphere about that place and it gets you.”
“Hadn’t occurred to me.”
“No.” Mame looked at him sideways. She was a shade incredulous. “If I owned all that, just by right of birth, I’d see that nobody ever took it from me.”