But I had no mind, now, to undress and rest. I desired to go to the veranda, and did fume and curse and bully poor Nick until he picked me up and carried me thither and did seat me within a large and cushioned Windsor chair.
Then, madded, he went away to fish for a silver pike in our canoe, saying with much viciousness that I might shout my throat raw and perish there ere he would stir a foot to put me to bed again.
So I watched him go down to the shore where the canoe lay, lift in rod and line and paddle, and take water in high dudgeon.
"Even an ass knows when he's sick!" he called out to me. But I laughed at him and saw his broad paddle stab the water, and the birchen craft shoot out among the reeds.
Now it was in my thoughts to see how Mistress Penelope would choose to conduct, who had so long and so tranquilly ignored me.
For here was I established upon the spot where she had been accustomed to sit through the long afternoons ... and think on Steve Watts, no doubt!...
Comes Mistress Penelope in sprigged gown of lavender, and smelling fresh of the herb itself or of some faint freshness.
I rested both hands upon the arms of my Windsor chair and so managed to stand erect.
She turned rosy to her ear-tips at the sudden encounter, but her voice was self-possessed and in nowise altered when she greeted me.
I offered my hand; she extended hers and I saluted it.