‘I think,’ he says, ‘I’ll go and walk up and down outside, and have a look at them as they’re getting out of the cab. My plan, you see, is first to kiss mother. Then I’ve made up four things to say to father, and it’s after I’ve said them that the awkward time will come. So then I say, “I wonder what is in the evening papers”; and out I slip, and when I come back you will all have settled down to ordinary life, same as other people. That’s my plan.’ He goes off, not without hope, and Ginevra shrugs her shoulders forgivingly.
‘How strange boys are,’ she reflects. ‘Have you any “plan,” Amy?’
‘Only this, dear Ginevra, to leap into my mother’s arms.’
Ginevra lifts what can only be called a trouser leg, because that is what it is, though they are very seldom seen alone. ‘What is this my busy bee is making?’
‘It’s a gentleman’s leg,’ Amy explains, not without a sweet blush. ‘You hand-sew them and stretch them over a tin cylinder, and they are then used as umbrella stands. Art in the Home says they are all the rage.’
‘Oh, Amy, Boudoir Gossip says they have quite gone out.’
‘Again! Every art decoration I try goes out before I have time to finish it.’
She remembers the diary.
‘Did my Ginevra like my new page?’
‘Dearest, that is what I came down to speak about. You forgot to give me the key.’