“Yes, Lord Paramour. During the rose season, for instance, she insists on occupying a suite on the ground floor, from which she can at any moment step out and bathe herself in the beauty of the flowers....”
“You turn a phrase very prettily, madam.”
“Oh, thank you, Lord Paramour,” breathed Mrs. Lyon-West. “But, as you will understand, her occupying a bedroom and a bathroom just there makes things just a leetle awkward. For she insists on having her blinds drawn open, that she may enjoy the roses over her toilet, and so of course the gardeners cannot enter the rose garden during the morning, as it distracts them from their work.”
“Lazy dogs!” cried Lord Paramour.
“Ah, here it is!” cried his hostess as, rounding an angle of the house, they came upon the rose garden. “It is supposed to be the best rose garden in the country.”
“Enchanting,” said Lord Paramour. “Enchanting, considering the gardeners do no work in it in the mornings.”
“Oh, there’s Niblick, the agent!” cried Mrs. Lyon-West. “I must speak to him for a moment. Do excuse me a moment, Lord Paramour. I will be back in one moment.”
Lord Paramour, of course, excused her; and very pleasantly whiled away twenty minutes with a cigarette in the rose garden. He paced about.... He saw the roses.... He saw a rose in particular, a white one....
IV
The day passed in elegant conversation, as is the way with the landed gentry all the world over. Lord Paramour and Miss Lyon-West, beautiful in vermilion organdie, went for a walk in the afternoon; but on their return Mrs. Lyon-West observed on her daughter’s cheeks none of those signs of pretty confusion which denote a happy consummation; they were still the pale cheeks of a young lady of fashion; they were unmantled.