Comus, who had emptied his cigarette-case, became
suddenly clamorous at the prospect of being temporarily
stranded without a smoke. Youghal took the last
remaining cigarette from his own case and gravely
bisected it.
“Friendship could go no further,” he observed,
as he gave one-half to the doubtfully appeased Comus,
and lit the other himself.
“There are heaps more in the hall,” said
Elaine.
“It was only done for the Saint Martin of Tours
effect,” said Youghal; “I hate smoking
when I’m rushing through the air. Good-bye.”
The departing galley-slave stepped forth into the
sunlight, radiant and confident. A few minutes
later Elaine could see glimpses of his white car as
it rushed past the rhododendron bushes. He woos
best who leaves first, particularly if he goes forth
to battle or the semblance of battle.
Somehow Elaine’s garden of Eternal Youth had
already become clouded in its imagery. The girl-figure
who walked in it was still distinctly and unchangingly
herself, but her companion was more blurred and undefined,
as a picture that has been superimposed on another.
Youghal sped townward well satisfied with himself.
To-morrow, he reflected, Elaine would read his speech
in her morning paper, and he knew in advance that
it was not going to be one of his worst efforts.
He knew almost exactly where the punctuations of laughter
and applause would burst in, he knew that nimble fingers
in the Press Gallery would be taking down each gibe
and argument as he flung it at the impassive Minister
confronting him, and that the fair lady of his desire
would be able to judge what manner of young man this
was who spent his afternoon in her garden, lazily chaffing
himself and his world.
And he further reflected, with an amused chuckle,
that she would be vividly reminded of Comus for days
to come, when she took her afternoon tea, and saw
the bread-and-butter reposing in an unaccustomed dish.
Towards four o’clock on a hot afternoon Francesca
stepped out from a shop entrance near the Piccadilly
end of Bond Street and ran almost into the arms of
Merla Blathlington. The afternoon seemed to
get instantly hotter. Merla was one of those
human flies that buzz; in crowded streets, at bazaars
and in warm weather, she attained to the proportions
of a human bluebottle. Lady Caroline Benaresq
had openly predicted that a special fly-paper was being
reserved for her accommodation in another world; others,
however, held the opinion that she would be miraculously
multiplied in a future state, and that four or more
Merla Blathlingtons, according to deserts, would be
in perpetual and unremitting attendance on each lost
soul.
“Here we are,” she cried, with a glad
eager buzz, “popping in and out of shops like
rabbits; not that rabbits do pop in and out of shops
very extensively.”
It was evidently one of her bluebottle days.
