"You are the only modern one of us three," he reminded her, amusedly recognizing that her unusually broad views, contact with which he had once feared for Ferlie, were responsible for their present re-union. "Ferlie tells me that she has no evidence for a divorce, nor can she seek it, in consideration of the Church she has joined."
"Bless my soul!" exclaimed Aunt B., exasperated that any Church should continue to consider joined what she had been at such infinite pains to put asunder. "Surely you, Cyprian, are old enough to smile at sects and Churches! Ferlie would not be true to type if, at her age, a cardinal did not seem too picturesque to be a liar. And, believe me, the Pope was the only safe substitute for you."
"You, surely, are not advocating collusion?" asked Cyprian, tickled, in spite of himself, at this feminine Juggernaut, the wheels of whose common-sense responded to no brake till she had guided them triumphantly past her goal.
"I don't believe there is 'no cause,'" she snapped: "If he is a gentleman he will make one, since he has obviously admitted her right to leave him. It can't affect the child's inheritance. An atom of patience, and the whole affair might be straightened out with a minimum of scandal."
"There is no necessity for even a perfectly respectable scandal," Cyprian assured her. "Ferlie is coming out to Burma with me, to live there as my sister. After a time, the man can get his marriage annulled if he wishes, on the ground of desertion; but that is unlikely to affect us."
Miss Trefusis searched his face with an expression of mingled admiration and incredulity on her own.
"Yes, I am afraid you mean what I think you mean," she said. "You are more of a child than she is, and I'd like to shake you. I'd almost rather you eloped healthily—without a new wedding-ring."
"I am so sorry to disappoint you," Cyprian said.
She laid a hand on his arm which he immediately imprisoned in his.
"Excelsior, then! Go and freeze to death upon your mountain top, both of you. I have interfered enough in bringing your bodily forms together. I dare not dig inquisitive fingers into your souls."