Pamela began to laugh hysterically. She got up from the tea-table and walked to the opposite window. She reflected that it was impossible to argue with Lottie Prynne; she had no sense of humor. But the sting of the situation was this gossip of the Billops. They were related to Paul but Sidney was making it intolerable by circulating some story about the Astrys and the Belhavens. As yet Pamela only half knew it; she had forbidden Mrs. Billop to repeat it to her, but not even her prohibition would silence Sidney's foolish tongue, and, to make matters worse, he had accepted an invitation from Astry for Thursday night. They were all bidden there to dinner, and Pamela wondered if Charter would go. A woman's sixth sense told her that he loved Rachel and that there were shoals ahead. Pamela, who was happily married, found John's misery absorbingly interesting.
"Pamela, your back's charming," said Dr. Macclesfield, from the tea-table, "but Mrs. Prynne and I feel obscured without the light of your countenance."
Pamela turned, laughing. "Are you going to dine at the Astrys' Thursday night, Doctor?"
"My dear, I wouldn't miss it for the world; I want to see the parrots."
"I'm afraid of Astry," Lottie Prynne said; "he looks straight through you with those cold eyes of his. And I hate that den with the skulls and the toads and the old warming-pans."
Dr. Macclesfield choked violently. "No, no, no water!" he gasped to Pamela, "it was a crumb of macaroon."
"I don't know what to do," she said, "but I read somewhere that you ought to stand people on their heads for choking."
"How in the world could you do it?" objected Mrs. Prynne; "if they didn't balance themselves with their hands they'd topple over and choke worse than ever."
"Pamela's a mental acrobat," gasped the doctor, wiping his eyes, "you can't follow her, Mrs. Prynne."
"Here comes Paul now with Colonel Sedley and Sidney," announced Pamela, looking out of the window.