Edith looked at him reproachfully.

'Well, I didn't call Dilly a beast. I haven't broken Miss Townsend's rules. She made a new rule I wasn't to call her a beast before breakfast--'

'What, you're allowed to call her these awful names after breakfast?'

'No. She made a rule before breakfast I wasn't to call Dilly a beast, and I haven't. How did you know it meant her anyway? It might have meant somebody else.'

'That's prevaricating; it's mean--not like you, Archie.'

'Well, I never called her a beast. No-one can say I did. And besides, anybody would have called her a beast after how she went on.'

'What are you angry with the child for?'

'Oh, she bothers so. The moment I imitate the man with the German accent she begins to cry. She says she doesn't like me to do it. She says she can't bear me to. Then she goes and tells Miss Townsend I slapped her, and Miss Townsend blames me.'

'Then you shouldn't have slapped her; it was horrid of you; you ought to remember she's a little girl and weaker than you.'

'I did remember...'

'Oh, Archie!'

'Well, I'll make it up if she begs my pardon; not unless she does I sha'n't,' said Archie magnanimously.

'I shall certainly not allow her to do anything of the kind.'

At this moment Dilly came in, with her finger in her tiny mouth, and went up to Archie, drawling with a pout, and in a whining voice:

'I didn't mean to.'

Archie beamed at once.

'That's all right, Dilly,' he said forgivingly.

Then he turned to his mother.

'Mother, have you got that paper?'

'Yes, I have indeed!'

'Well, cross out--that, and put in Aspasia Matilda Ottley. Sorry, Dilly!' He kissed her, and they ran off together hand in hand; looking like cherubs, and laughing musically.

CHAPTER IX

Aylmer

At the Carlton Aylmer had easily persuaded Bruce and Edith to dine with him next day, although they were engaged to the elder Mrs Ottley already. He said he expected two or three friends, and he convinced them they must come too. It is only in London that people meet for the first time at a friend's house, and then, if they take to each other, practically live together for weeks after. No matter what social engagements they may happen to have, these are all thrown aside for the new friend. London people, with all their correctness, are really more unconventional than any other people in the world. For instance, in Paris such a thing could never happen in any kind of _monde_, unless, perhaps, it were among artists and Bohemians; and even then it would be their great object to prove to one another that they were not wanting in distractions and were very much in demand; the lady, especially, would make the man wait for an opportunity of seeing her again, from calculation, to make herself seem of more value. Such second-rate solicitudes would never even occur to Edith. But she had a scruple about throwing over old Mrs Ottley.

'Won't your mother be disappointed?' Edith asked.

'My dear Edith, you can safely leave that to me. Of course she'll be disappointed, but you can go round and see her, and speak to her nicely and tell her that after all we can't come because we've got another engagement.'

'And am I to tell her it's a subsequent one? Otherwise she'll wonder we didn't mention it before.'

'Don't be in a hurry, dear. Don't rush things; remember... she's my mother. Perhaps to you, Edith, it seems a rather old-fashioned idea, and I daresay you think it's rot, but to me there's something very sacred about the idea of a mother.' He lit a cigarette and looked in the gla.s.s.

'Yes, dear. Then, don't you think we really ought to have kept our promise to dine with her? She'll probably be looking forward to it. I daresay she's asked one or two people she thinks we like, to meet us.'

'Circ.u.mstances alter cases, Edith. If it comes to that, Aylmer Ross has got two or three people coming to dine with him whom he thinks we might like. He said so himself. That's why he's asked us.'

'Yes, but he can't have asked them on purpose, Bruce, because, you see, we didn't know him on Thursday.'

'Well, why should he have asked them on purpose? _How_ you argue! _How_ you go on! It really seems to me you're getting absurdly exacting and touchy, Edith dear. I believe all those flowers from the emba.s.sy have positively turned your head. _Why_ should he have asked them on purpose. You admit yourself that we didn't even know the man last Thursday, and yet you expect--' Bruce stopped. He had got into a slight tangle.

Edith looked away. She had not quite mastered the art of the inward smile.

'Far better, in my opinion,' continued Bruce, walking up and down the room.--'Now, don't interrupt me in your impulsive way, but hear me out--it would be far more kind and sensible in every way for you to sit right down at that little writing-table, take out your stylographic pen and write and tell my mother that I have a bad attack of influenza....

Yes; one should always be considerate to one's parents. I suppose it really is the way I was brought up that makes me feel this so keenly,'

he explained.

Edith sat down to the writing-table. 'How bad is your influenza?'

'Oh, not very bad; because it would worry her: a slight attack.--Stop!

Not so very slight--we must let her think it's the ordinary kind, and then she'll think it's catching and she won't come here for a few days, and that will avoid our going into the matter in detail, which would be better.'

'If she thinks it's catching, dear, she'll want Archie and Dilly, and Miss Townsend and Nurse to go and stay with her in South Kensington, and that will be quite an affair.'

'Right as usual; very thoughtful of you; you're a clever little woman sometimes, Edith. Wait!'--he put up his hand with a gesture frequent with him, like a policeman stopping the traffic at Hyde Park Corner.

'Wait!--leave out the influenza altogether, and just say I've caught a slight chill.'

'Yes. Then she'll come over at once, and you'll have to go to bed.'

'My dear Edith,' said Bruce, 'you're over-anxious; I shall do nothing of the kind. There's no need that I should be laid up for this. It's not serious.'

He was beginning to believe in his own illness, as usual.

'Air! (I want to go round to the club)--tonic treatment!--that's the thing!--that's often the very best thing for a chill--this sort of chill.... Ah, that will do very nicely. Very neatly written....

Good-bye, dear.'

As soon as Bruce had gone out Edith rang up the elder Mrs Ottley on the telephone, and relieved her anxiety in advance. They were great friends; the sense of humour possessed by her mother-in-law took the sting out of the relationship.

The dinner at Aylmer's house was a great success. Bruce enjoyed himself enormously, for he liked nothing better in the world than to give his opinion. And Aylmer was specially anxious for his view as to the authenticity of a little Old Master he had acquired, and took notes, also, of a word of advice with regard to electric lighting, admitting he was not a very practical man, and Bruce evidently was.