‘I will talk to you later on. You may sit next me at dinner, if you can contrive it,’ whispered Bella hurriedly before she joined her aunt.
‘Be careful in what way you talk to Mr Golightly,’ remarked the latter lady in an undertone. ‘Above all, no frivolity; and don’t forget that you have been brought up in a pious family.’
Archie came bustling up. ‘Now, Lady Renshaw, permit me the honour.—Golightly, I leave you to look after Miss Wynter and Miss Loraine.—By the way,’ he added, ‘what has become of the vicar and his friend the doctor?’
‘It is only that Septimus is late as usual,’ answered Miss Pen. ‘That big trout has detained him, and Dr M‘Murdo is with him. No doubt they will turn up by the time dinner is half over.’
‘Are you not going to join us at dinner, dear Madame De Vigne?’ inquired the dowager with much suavity.
‘Not to-day, I think, Lady Renshaw. Will you allow me for once to plead a woman’s usual excuse—a headache?’
‘So sorry.’ Then to herself: ‘She dines alone. Another evidence of a mystery.’ Then aloud: ‘And you, dear Miss Gaisford?’
‘I? Oh, I never miss my dinner. They charge it in the bill whether one has it or not. Even now the savoury odours of the soup reach me from afar. I will join you anon.’
‘What an odd creature! Inclined to be satirical. I don’t think that I shall like her,’ was the other’s unspoken remark as she sailed out of the room on Mr Ridsdale’s arm.
Mr Golightly followed with the two young ladies.