"You explain—I wash my hands of it," she laughed.
She wore thick shoes and a walking-costume, and on her head was a little felt hat with a pheasant's feather. He had on an old tweed jacket and grey flannel bags. He held out his hand.
"Hope we're not dragging you from your work, George," he laughed. "Do you good anyway. I felt like a day off, so I dug out Julia. 'Down tools, Julia,' I said; 'no work to-day. Where shall we go? Shall we give George Coverham a surprise?' So here we are, to lunch, please. By Jove, there's a kingfisher!"
He sprang out on to the terrace to see where the electric-blue flash had whistled off to.
Swiftly I glanced at Julia. In her eyes was the old deep shining. But Derry called over his shoulder:
"That was a young one, wasn't it? Is there a nest? How many hatched out? Do they go for the fish?"
He seemed splendidly fit, perfectly happy. He seemed so happy that suddenly I wondered what I had been making myself so miserable about. A weight seemed to lift all at once from my mind. Too much London had oppressed me, I supposed. Cambridge Circus is not the place for a country-living man to stay too long in. It bred too many fancies. Much better for the Circus-dweller to come into the country.
"It went over by that bank," Derry was saying, still peering after the kingfisher; and I stepped out.
"Yes. The nest's right in the bank. Six of them hatched. You'll see another in a minute."
But at that moment his eyes fell on the punt. Quickly he turned to Julia.