'That after so long an absence you should happen to come to Kingthorpe on the day that made such a change in my father's fortunes.'
'I came because of Bessie's birthday—as I told you before. Does this sad event make any difference to your father?' he asked innocently. 'Are there not——nearer relatives?'
'None that I know of.'
The elderly gentleman, a little hard of hearing, as he called it, looked on and wondered at this somewhat eccentric young couple, who seemed, from those snatches of speech which reached him, to be on the verge of a quarrel. He felt very sorry for the lady, who was so handsome, and so interesting. The young man was gentlemanlike and good looking, but had not that frank bright outlook which is the glory of a young Englishman. He was dressed a little too foppishly for the elder man's liking, and had the air of being over-careful of his own person.
And now the train had passed Sandown, was rushing on to Wimbledon and the London smoke. All the blue had gone out of the sky, all the beauty had gone from the earth, Ida thought, as small suburban villas followed each other in a monotonous sequence, some old and shabby, others new and smart; and then all that is ugliest in the great city surrounded them as they steamed slowly into Waterloo station.
A four-wheel cab took them to an hotel in the purlieus of Fleet Street, a big new hotel, but so shut in and surrounded by other buildings that Ida felt as if she could hardly breathe in it—she who had lived among gardens and green fields, and with all the winds of heaven blowing on her across the rolling downs, from the forest and the sea.
'What a hateful place London is!' she exclaimed. 'Can any one like to live in it?'
'All sensible people like it better than any other bit of the world, bar
Paris,' answered Brian. 'But it is not particularly pretty to look at.
City life is an acquired taste.'
This was on the stairs, while they were following the waiter to the private sitting-room for which Mr. Walford had asked. It was a neat little room on the first floor, looking into a stony city square, surrounded by business premises.
The waiter, after the manner of his kind, was loth to leave without an order. Ida declined anything in the way of luncheon; so Brian ordered tea and toast, and the man departed with an air of resignation rather than alacrity, considering the order a poor one.