“Silly fools,” she said; “the way people go on.  Read it—­what is it?  Read it.”

Mr. Hewson picked some bones out of the bloater with a dirty hand, placed the filleted morsel in his mouth, washed it down with a mouthful of tea, and then cleared his throat and began to read.

Mr. Arthur seized this opportunity.  “It’s quite fine again now,” he said in an undertone to Sally.

She expressed mild surprise—­the lifting of her eyebrows, the casual “Really.”  Then it seemed to her that he did not exactly deserve to be treated like that and she told him how she had got wet through, coming home.

“Changed your clothes, I hope,” he whispered.

“Oh yes.”

“You might get pneumonia, you know,” he said.

She smiled at that.  “And of such are the Kingdom of Heaven.”

He gazed at her in surprise.  “Why should you say that?” he asked.

“Don’t know—­why shouldn’t I?”

He looked down at his empty plate.  There was something he wanted to say to her.  He kept looking round the table for inspiration.  At last, with Mrs. Hewson’s burst of laughter at the paper’s description of the Pentecostal visitations, he took the plunge—­head down—­the words spluttering in whispers out of his lips.

“Would you care to come for a little walk down the Strand-on-Green?” he asked.  “It’s a lovely night now.”

In the half breath of a second, Sally’s eyes sought Janet’s face across the table.  Janet had heard and, with her eyes, she urged Sally to accept.  This all passed unknown to Mr. Arthur.  He thought Sally was hesitating—­the moments thumped in his heart.

“I don’t mind for a little while,” she said.

He rose from the table, conscious of victory.  “I’ll just go and get on my boots,” he said, and he slipped away.

Sally mounted to her room followed by Janet.

“He’s going to propose,” said Miss Hallard.

“He’s not,” retorted Sally.

“I’m perfectly certain he is.  He’s been excited about something all the evening.  He’s come into some money or something.  He talked to-night as if he could buy up all the art treasures in the kingdom.”

“You think he’s going to buy me up?”

“He’s going to make his offer.  What’ll you do?”

“Well—­what can I do?  Would you marry him?”

“That’s not the question.  There’s no chance of him asking me.  You can’t speculate on whether you’ll marry a man until he asks you—­your mind is biassed before then.”

“I don’t believe you’d marry any one,” said Sally.

“It’s quite probable,” she replied laconically.

Sally began to take off her hat again.  “I’m not going out with him,” she said.  “I shall hate it.”

“Don’t be foolish—­put on that hat, and see what it’s like to be proposed to by an earnest young gentleman on the banks of a river, at nine o’clock in the evening.  Go on—­don’t be foolish, Sally.  It does a woman good to be proposed to—­teaches her manners—­go on.  You may like him—­you don’t know.”