I was not her dear. That enviable position was held by the doctor's wife, a tall girl with red hair. Before her marriage, so Mrs. Lavater had informed me, she was a professional pianist. Whether in cinemas or the Queen's Hall, I had no means of telling. On the same authority she was to have a baby in March.
She now expressed no wonder at the richness of Mrs. Mackenzie's underlinen and indicated that, from the prices charged at her husband's store, it might well be sewn with diamonds....
'Who can that be on the road?' interrupted Mrs. Lavater.
We turned and stared down the road which, leading to the lake, runs straight for a mile or more outside the township. As the white man in ragged khaki, with a gun bearer at his heels, came near, to my surprise I recognised Archie.
'Do you know Captain Sinclair well?' I was asked when the first flood of conjecture had abated.
'I doubt if any one does,' was my reply, which, in my own mind, included his wife.
'Of course he's very nice,' said the red-haired girl, staring up the road, 'but don't you find him just a little bit dull? Now she's such a lively little thing.'
Mrs. Lavater contributed the inevitable platitude about opposites.
'His marriage must have been the adventure of his life,' persisted the other. 'You can't imagine anything much happening to Mr. Sinclair.'
The unromantic object of our interest was now nearly within hail. I noticed that he walked like a tired or an old man.