“And may I come again soon?” he asked.
“As often as you wish,” she answered. “You have the advantage of proximity, at least.”
VI
CONFIDENCE AND SCRUPLES
The next month, to Croyden, went pleasantly enough. He was occupied with getting the household machinery to run according to his ideas—and still retain Moses and Josephine, who, he early discovered, were invaluable to him; in meeting the people worth knowing in the town and vicinity, and in being entertained, and entertaining—all very quietly and without ostentation.
He had dined, or supped, or played Bridge at all the houses, had given a few small things himself, and ended by paying off all scores with a garden party at Clarendon, which Mrs. Carrington had managed for him with exquisite taste (and, to him, amazing frugality)—and, more wonderful still, with an entire effacement of self. It was Croyden’s party throughout, though her hand was at the helm, her brain directed—and Hampton never knew.
And the place had looked attractive; with the house set in its wide sweep of velvety lawn amid great trees and old-fashioned flowers and hedges. With the furniture cleaned and polished, the old china scattered in cupboard and on table, the portraits and commissions freshly dusted, the swords glistening as of yore. 89
And in that month, Croyden had come to like Hampton immensely. The absence, in its society, of all attempts at show, to make-believe, to impress, to hoodwink, was refreshingly novel to him, who, hitherto, had known it only as a great sham, a huge affectation, with every one striving to outdo everyone else, and all as hollow as a rotten gourd.