"They will be calling me the round gentleman," Tommy said ruefully to her that evening, as he strolled with her towards the lake, and indeed he was looking stout. Mrs. Jerry did not accompany them; she wanted to be seen with her trying stepdaughter as little as possible, and Tommy's had been the happy proposal that he should attend them alternately—"fling away my own figure to save yours," he had said gallantly to Mrs. Jerry.
"Do you mind?" Lady Pippinworth asked.
"I mind nothing," he replied, "so long as I am with you."
He had not meant to begin so near the point where they had last left off; he had meant to begin much farther back: but an irresistible desire came over him to make sure that she really did permit him to say this sort of thing.
Her only reply was a flutter of the little fans and a most contemptuous glance.
"Alice," said Tommy, in the old way.
"Well?"
"You don't understand what it is to me to say Alice again."
"Many people call me Alice."
"But they have a right to."