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She did not dare to lead him to it again. It was not long before he left her, on the timely arrival of another friend. The introduction brought about by Miss Mazerod did not seem to have been an entire success, for they parted gravely and without a word expressing the hope of meeting again. And yet Dora liked him, for he was strong and purposeful, such as she would have had all men.
He disliked Edith Mazerod, because he suspected that his own early career had probably been discussed in her hearing, and her easy lightness of heart was to him as incomprehensible as it was suspicious. Dora he rather feared without knowing why. "I suppose you know India well?" she said, looking straight in front of her. "Too well," was the reply, with a sharp sidelong glance. He was right.
Miss Mazerod replied; and both young ladies stood up to curtsey to the Royal party. It was the great artistic soiree of the year, and crowds of nobodies jostled each other in their mad desire to deceive whosoever might be credulous into the belief that they were somebodies.
Glynde nor Providence could have chosen a better companion for Dora at this time than Edith Mazerod. There was a breezy simplicity about this young lady's view of life which seemed to have the power of simplifying life itself. There are some people like this to whom is vouchsafed a limited comprehension of evil and an unlimited belief in good.
"Have I? I am sorry for that." "No, there is no reason to be sorry. They all have it." "But," protested Dora, "I am not one of them. I am only aping the Romans." "You do it well; I shall study your method. You do it better than Edith Mazerod." "Edith is young hopelessly, enviably young. Do you know them well?" "Yes, I knew them in India." "Of course; I forgot."
"When did you come back to England?" inquired Edith Mazerod, whose father had worked with this man in India. "I oh! I have been home six months," he replied, shaking hands with a subtle empressemant which was more effective than words. "On leave?" "No. Laid on the shelf."
They were among the well-dressed throng now crowding back to the chairs. When Arthur had handed Dora over to the care of Lady Mazerod he lifted his hat and took his departure with that perfect savoir faire which was his forte. "To sum up all, he has the worst fault-a husband can have, he's not my choice." There is something doubtful in a love-making that is in more than two pairs of hands.
"Of course," said Dora, when they were seated again, and the strains of the Welsh air had been suppressed "by desire," "they may be very great swells; I have no doubt they are in their particular way; but they do not look it." Miss Mazerod looked round critically. "Some of them," she said, "are frame-makers, a good many of them, with big bills in high places.
Her ideal woman has that sort of droop of the throat I imagine she-tries to teach it to the factory. She objects to backbone." Miss Mazerod, who possessed a very firm little specimen of the adjunct mentioned, drew herself up and smiled commiseratingly. "Then," said Dora, "I feel quite consoled about my sketches." For the first time Miss Mazerod looked serious.
Owing to the activity and enterprise of this young gentleman, tea was soon procured, and consequently despatched before the interval was over and before the band had wet its whistle with something of a different nature from that in vogue on the lawn. A stroll through the gardens was proposed, and Lady Mazerod sent the young people off alone.
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