"Don't you see the change in Richard?" she asked eagerly. "He's become quite another creature since General Lingard came here. I've always thought you kept Richard far too much shut up, Dick——"
"You never said so before," he said sharply.
She shrugged her shoulders. "It was none of my business."
Her face clouded, and with hasty accord they changed the subject, and with exactly the same words: "Who had we better ask first?" And then they stopped, and laughed. For the moment these two, Richard Maule's heir and Richard Maule's wife, were on more cordial terms than they had been for years.
"You have now got all the letters," she cried gaily—"Richard's, mine, and yours! Look them over, and make out a list—I'm sure you're much better at that sort of thing than I am!"
He left her to carry out her behest.
If there was anything like real entertaining to be done at Rede Place, all kinds of arrangements would have to be made, and the making of them must fall on Dick Wantele. Athena had told the truth when she had described herself to General Lingard as only a guest in her husband's house. But she had omitted to add that it was an arrangement which had hitherto suited her perfectly, and the only one she would have tolerated.
CHAPTER VIII
"To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance."