"Yes, I'd forgotten! Good girl, Maggie! Well, get me the scissors and a basket, and then you might put the vases ready in the little room."
Maggie flew to obey the commands, and Toni, to whom the idea of giving orders was still almost ludicrous, strolled to the window to await her return.
The room overlooked the river, and on that account was a favourite with Toni. It was reached by a short flight of stairs apart from the main staircase, and boasted a large casement window, built over the terrace below, and giving the river an air of proximity which always delighted Toni.
To-day the water sparkled in the sunshine with a very cheerful effect; and as Toni looked a cream-white swan drifted by, the sun's light turning its feathers into a kind of gilded snow. A punt passed slowly with two occupants, one a girl in a white frock, lying lazily on a heap of blue-green cushions, her uncovered head protected from the sun by a scarlet parasol, the other a bronzed and fair-haired youth, who wielded his pole with an athletic grace purely Greek.
Toni's eyes softened as the two glided by. Her own happiness was so immense, her love for Owen had been so wonderfully, so completely satisfied, that she wished all other girls to be as happy as she was; and although the two in the punt were only visible for a few moments she thought she could read in their faces the story of their mutual attraction.
When Maggie returned Toni took the basket and went out into the garden. Gathering flowers was an occupation of which she never tired. Never, since her days on the hill-slope above Naples, had she been able to indulge her passionate love for flowers; and to the girl who had been wont to regard sixpence spent on a branch of golden mimosa, or a handful of the big pink carnations which seem indigenous to the London streets, as something of an extravagance, the delight of filling bowls and vases with unlimited supplies of the loveliest, freshest flowers could not be overrated.
To-day she cut more lavishly than usual in Fanny's honour, and when, just as the lunch gong sounded, she rested from her labours, the lovely old house was a dream of beauty and colour and scent.
Snapdragons, in every shade of yellow and pink and deep, rich rose, stood in tall jars, wherever there was a dark corner to be lighted up. Big blue bowls held masses of roses of every describable hue, whose fragrance scented all the house; and every available inch of space had been utilized as a resting-place for one or more vases of the sweetest, gayest blooms imaginable.
Even Toni was satisfied at last, and she hurried over her lunch in good spirits. Just as she was rising from the table a thought struck her.
"Kate, do you think we might have tea in here? You see—we ought to have a table, I think—and it wouldn't matter for once, would it?"