Once or twice Penelope had caught a glimpse of that hot-headed temper which lay hidden beneath Roger's somewhat blunt exterior.
"Lady Gertrude will be furious!" murmured Nan reminiscently.
"I think she'll have the right to be," answered Penelope, with quiet rebuke in her tones. "It really was abominable of you to run away like that."
Nan shrugged her shoulders, and Ralph looked across at her, smiling broadly.
"You're a very exasperating young person, Nan," he said. "If you were going to be my wife, I believe I should beat you."
"Well, that would at least break the monotony of things," she retorted. But her lips set themselves in a straight, hard, line at the remembrance of Roger's stormy threat: "I might even do that."
"Is it monotony you're suffering from?" asked Ralph quickly.
She nodded.
"I'm fed up with the country and its green fields—never anything but green fields! They're so eternally, damnably green!"
"Oh, Nan! And the scenery in Cornwall is perfectly lovely!" protested
Penelope feebly.