Chevenix came to the tea-table and stood by her. “I think Vicky's all right. I do indeed. It seems to me she'd give her ears to see you—simple ears. Sinclair, you'll find, is the trouble. He's the usual airy kind of ass. Makes laws for his womankind, and has 'em kept. Vicky likes it, too.”
“I suppose he is like that,” Sanchia said, as if it was a curious case. “I have never spoken to him. He was about, of course—but Vicky took him up after—my time.” For a moment emotion, like a wet cloud, drifted across her eyes. “I should like to see Vicky again. It's eight years.”
Chevenix was anxious. “I do think it could be managed, you know—with tact. I'd do any mortal thing, Sancie—you know I would, but—” He despaired. “Tact! Tact! That's what you want.”
Her soft mood chased away. She looked at him full. “I can't use what you call tact with Vicky. That means that I am to grovel.” She drove him back to his photographs. He peered into the little print on the wall.
“What have we here? A domestic scene, my hat! You appear to be bathing—well over the knee, anyhow. High-girt Diana, when no man is by. Awfully jolly you look. But he is by. Who on earth's this chap?” He peered. Sanchia from her tea-table watched him, in happy muse. He shouted his discovery. “I remember the chap! Now, what on earth was he called? Your casual friend, who lived in a cart and only had three pair of bags. Nohouse—Senhouse! That was the man.” He looked with interest at the pair, then at Sanchia. “Mixed bathing—what?”
She laughed. “Yes—we both got wet to the skin. Percy Charnock took it ages ago—oh, ages! Before I was out, or knew Nevile, or anybody except you. It was ten years ago. I must have been eighteen. It was when I was at Gorston with Grace Mauleverer—trying to save water-lilies from drowning in green scum. He—Mr. Senhouse—came along in his cart, and saw me, and lent me his bed for a raft—and worked it himself. That was the first time I ever saw him—” she ended softly in a sigh: “before anything happened.”
Chevenix listened, nodding at the photograph. “Wish to heaven, my dear, nothing had ever happened. The less that happens to girls the better for them, I believe. Not but what this chap would have been all right. If he had happened, now! He was as mad as a hatter, but a real good sort. Did I tell you?” He grew suddenly reminiscent. “I saw him a little more than a year ago—with a pretty woman. Had a talk with him—asked him to come up and have a look at you. It was when Nevile went off on this trip. No, no, I liked old Senhouse. He was a nice-minded chap. Not the kind to eat you up—and take everything you've got as if he had a right to it. No. That's Nevile's line, that is. You wouldn't see Nevile lending you his bed, or risking his life after water-lilies.”
Sanchia's eyes were narrow and critical. She peered as if she were trying to find good somewhere in Nevile Ingram. “He'd risk anything to get what he thought were his rights. But not upon a bed for a raft. He'd write to London for the latest thing in coracles. He's very conventional.”
“You have to be,” said Chevenix with sudden energy. He wheeled round upon her as he spoke. “We all have to be. We go by clockwork. You get the striking all wrong if you play tricks.” He resumed the photograph. “By Jove, but that suits you. Child of Nature, what? I suppose you're happiest when you're larking?”
“Mud-larking?” she asked him, laughing and blushing.