"Have you not another rose for me, petite?" he asked, as he came forward:
"It is the only one which is yet open, papa; but there will be a lot more in a day or two."
"By which time they will have become common. N'importe. I must try to find existence endurable without one." Then, turning to his wife: "The postman has just brought me a letter which must have been delayed in transit, since it was evidently intended to reach me yesterday. It is dated from Paris a couple of days ago, and is written by my old friend, Colonel Winslow. In it he says that we may expect him at Fairlawn on Thursday--that's today--in time for dinner. He may arrive at any moment."
"Was it not Colonel Winslow, papa, who stayed with us at Bordighera five or six years ago?"
"That was the man."
"I was in short frocks at the time, and I remember that I quite fell in love with him."
"I should advise you not to repeat the process now," remarked young Deane in an aside to her.
"And why not, pray?" she asked in the same tone. "Colonel Winslow, let me tell you, is a very charming man. I always did like elderly men better than boys. I think it very likely that I shall fall desperately in love with him."
Without giving her lover time to reply, she picked up her hat, and swinging it by its ribbons, passed out through one of the long windows. Before she had time to cross the lawn and plunge into the shrubbery beyond, Walter was following her. Drelincourt and his wife stood watching them through the other window.
The twenty years which had passed over Felix Drelincourt's head since his first wife's death had changed him very little to outward seeming. His black hair was turning gray about the temples, his long, thin face looked a trifle longer and thinner, a few crow's feet had gathered about his eyes, and there was a slight but perceptible stoop of his tall, lean figure. And that was all.