Part 64

“Perhaps you’d like to move them back,” she suggested.

“No,” said I. “I’ve done enough to create the impression.”

“And how did you like it?”

“It was,” said I, “in its way a pleasant enough illusion.” And I shrugged my shoulders, and blew a ring of smoke.

To my very considerable gratification, Dolly’s tone manifested some annoyance as she asked:

“Why do you say, ‘in its way’?”

“Because, in spite of the momentary pleasure I gained from feeling myself a married man, I could not banish the idea that we should not permanently suit one another.”

“Oh, you thought that?” said Dolly, smiling again.

“I must confess it,” said I. “The fault, I know, would be mine.”

“I’m sure of that,” said Dolly.

“But the fact is that I can’t exist in too high altitudes. The rarefaction of the moral atmosphere--”

“Please don’t use all those long words.”

“Well, then, to put it plainly,” said I, with a pleasant smile, “I felt all the time that Mrs. Hilary would be too good for me.”

It is not very often that it falls to my humble lot to startle Lady Mickleham out of her composure. But at this point she sat up quite straight in her chair; her cheek flushed, and her eyelids ceased to droop in indolent insouciance.

“Mrs. Hilary!” she said. “What has Mrs. Hilary--?

“I really thought you understood,” said I, “the object of my experiment.”

Dolly glanced at me. I believe that my expression was absolutely innocent--and I am, of course sure that hers expressed mere surprise.

“I thought,” she said, after a pause, “that you were thinking of Nellie Phaeton.”

“Oh, I see,” cried I smiling. “A natural mistake, to be sure.”

“She thought so too,” pursued Dolly, biting her lip.

“Did she though?”

“And I’m sure she’d be quite annoyed if she thought you were thinking of Mrs. Hilary.”

“As a matter of fact,” I observed, “she didn’t understand what I was doing at all.”

Dolly leant back. The relics of a frown still dwelt on her brow; presently, however, she began to swing her hat on her forefinger, and she threw a look at me. I immediately looked up toward the branches above my head.

“We might as well go in to lunch,” said Dolly.

“By all means,” I acquiesced, with alacrity.

We went out into the sunshine, and came where the pots were. Suddenly Dolly said:

“Go back and sit down again, Mr. Carter.”