“There, you see how ridiculous you were making things, wanting to be so proud.”
“Yes, but wait a minute. Supposing I decided that I should like you to buy me a piano.”
“Then I should begin to think that Paul had been at the red wine. You are not made that way. You give; you would always be wanting to give. Now, be a good man and go and try on that shirt and those trousers.”
Paul went like an obedient boy, and reappeared some five minutes later, looking quaintly self-conscious.
“They feel just right.”
She turned him round with a dominant forefinger.
“You must take care of your good clothes. I have bought you a fine pair of velour-à-cotes trousers for Sundays, and a little black jacket. Those linen trousers will wash. And now—I am quite rested; let us work.”
That swinging ridge-beam overhead was the first thing to be tackled. Paul went up the ladder and straddled his way up the gable end to the chimney-stack, and gave his directions to Manon. She had grasped what he wanted her to do, and had run out into the yard and got hold of the telephone wire whose lower end was fastened to a bit of an iron bar that Brent had driven into the ground.
“I pull?”
“That’s it.”