Between the two, from his college days, had been a sort of confidential intimacy which Beecher had the knack of cultivating.
Holliday having ordered the dinner, Mme. Fornez took special delight in countermanding everything that could be countermanded, substituting other wines and abolishing the soup, scolding her escort all the while with a calculated tyranny which Mrs. Fontaine admired with a slight smiling tribute of her lips, as the clever advertisement of a professional woman that Mr. Holliday's fetch and carry attentions were entirely on her own sufferance.
"How have you escaped being married?" said Mrs. Fontaine in a bantering tone to Beecher, after Mme. Fornez had relinquished him for a moment.
"Because I fly like a coward," he said, pleased at the compliment implied.
"Seriously, Teddy, you've been back in civilization two months and you are not yet caught?"
"I am not the marrying kind," he said, with conviction.
"What's he say—your Teddy?" said Mme. Fornez, turning, with a laugh.
Beecher repeated his statement.
"Allons donc, you!" She broke into a ripple of laughter. "What do you say, Madame Fontaine?"
Mrs. Fontaine's reply was a tolerant, amused smile, and, leaning over, she pinched his ear.