"We must hurry to get that train,—dear. When we live out here we'll have to sport a motor car, won't we?" he said buoyantly.
She answered slowly, "I don't know that I should want to live just here, after all."
"Why, I thought you were crazy about the country! And I've been thinking it might be the very thing for us to do. There's such a lot of building in these places now since business has looked up. Mrs. Phillips has asked me several times why I didn't move out here on the shore. Just before she left to-day she said in a joking way that if I wanted to build a lodge for her, I might take it for a year or so. Of course that's a joke. But I know she's bought lately a lot more property on the ravine, and she might be willing to let me have a small bit on reasonable terms. She's been so friendly all along!"
He was still in the flush of his triumph, and talked rapidly of all the plans that opened out before his fervent ambition. Suddenly he took note of the girl's mood and said sharply, "Nell, I believe you don't like her!"
"Why do you say that!" she exclaimed, surprised in her inner thoughts. "I don't really know."
"Why, it's plain enough. You never talk to her. You are always so cold! Louise is a chatty person; she likes to have you make an effort for her. And you treated Mrs. Rainbow in the same way."
"Oh, Francis! I didn't mean to be cold. Ought I to like them if you are to do work for them?"
Her lover laughed at her simplicity. Nevertheless, he felt somewhat disturbed at Helen's indifference to the social aspect of their marriage venture. He wished to make a proper stir in the puddle, and he was beginning to suspect that Helen had little aptitude for this distinctively woman's side of matrimony.
"Rich people always puzzle me," she continued apologetically. "They always have, except uncle Powers, and you never thought of him as rich! I don't feel as if I knew what they liked. They are so much preoccupied with their own affairs. That other time when I met Mrs. Phillips she was very much worried over the breakfast room and the underbutler's pantry! What is an underbutler's pantry, Francis?"
This raillery over the needs of the rich sounded almost anarchistic to the architect in his present mood, and they walked to the station silently in the gathering darkness. But after a time, on the train, he returned to the events of the afternoon, remarking with no relevancy:—