"I mourn my mystery, Tony."
She poured out tea. I passed the uninspiring food that accompanied it. We conversed in a lower key of tension. At last she said:
"If I don't walk, I'll break something."
A few moments afterwards we were in the street. She drew the breath of one suffering from exhausted air.
"Let us go up a hill."
Why the ordinary human being should ever desire to walk up hill I have never been able to discover. For me, the comfortable places. But with Lady Auriol the craving was symbolical of character. I agreed.
"Choose the least inaccessible," I pleaded.
We mounted the paths through the vines. At the top, we sat down. I wiped a perspiring brow. She filled her lungs with the air stirred by a faint breeze.
"Whereabouts is this circus?" she asked suddenly.
I told her, waving a hand in the direction of Clermont-Ferrand.