She was very pretty, anyway; he was proud of her, too, deep down in his heart. No doubt after a bit they would be quite happy together.
He finished the chocolate cake, and asked if he might smoke; he was longing for a cigarette. He was not quite sure if it would be correct to smoke in a room which would be chiefly used by Christine. With Cynthia things had been so different—she smoked endless cigarettes herself; there was never any need to ask permission of her.
He could not imagine Christine with a cigarette between her pretty lips. And yet—yet he had liked it with Cynthia. Odd how different women were.
"Please do smoke," said Christine. She was glad he had asked her; glad that for the rest of his life whenever he smoked a cigarette, it would not merely be Jimmy Challoner blowing puffs of smoke into the air, but her husband. She glowed at the thought.
Jimmy was much more happy now; to his own way of thinking he was getting on by leaps and bounds. He went over and sat on the arm of Christine's chair; another moment and he would have put an arm round her, but a soft, apologetic tapping at the door sent him flying away from her to the other side of the room.
He was carefully turning the pages of a book when he answered, "Come in," with elaborate carelessness. One of the hotel servants entered; he carried a letter on a tray; he handed it to Christine.
"A messenger from the Sunderland Hotel has just brought this, madam. He told me to say that it has been there two days, but they did not know till this morning where to send it on to you."
Christine's face quivered. She did not want to think of the Sunderland; her mother had died there; it would always be associated in her mind with the great tragedy of her life. She took the letter hesitatingly; she did not know the writing. She waited till the servant had gone before she opened it.
Jimmy was still turning the leaves of the railway guide feverishly. At the shutting of the door he turned with a sigh of relief.
"A letter?" Christine was drawing the paper from its envelope; pink paper, smelling faintly of lilies. Jimmy lit a fresh cigarette. He walked over to the window and stood looking into the street; a horribly respectable street it was, he thought impatiently, of good-class houses, with windows neatly curtained and knockers carefully polished.