“We leave Paris to-morrow,” said Clementina; buttoning her cotton gloves. “I must work, and Tommy must work, and Etta must learn to cook and sew and scrub saucepans. The holiday is about to end.”
Two sighs greeted the announcement.
“Can’t we have one other day?” Etta pleaded.
“You just need the extra day to make you quite fit again,” said Tommy.
Clementina, unmoved by pleading or sophistry, replied, “We start to-morrow.”
Etta looked at Tommy and sorrowfully licked from her finger-tips the squirted cream of an éclair. They had just finished tea at Colombin’s, a form of amusement to which Etta was addicted. She liked the crowded room, the band, the bustle of the waitresses and the warm smell of tea and chocolate and pastry. She also had the perverted craving of female youth to destroy its appetite for dinner. She looked at Tommy and cleansed herself from éclair like a dainty kitten; but Tommy’s eyes were fixed to the entrance of the tea-room. He half rose from his chair.
“Lord Almighty, if that isn’t Uncle Ephraim!”
“Where?” cried Clementina.
He nodded, and Clementina, turning her head, saw Quixtus, one of a party of four, two men and two ladies, threading their way between the chattering tables under the guidance of a waitress. They found places not far off. Quixtus sat down with his back to Clementina.
“I wonder whom he has got hold of,” said Tommy.