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But she did not do it; advisability, the Polkingtons' patron saint, suggested to her that one does not learn to shine in the caged life by allowing oneself the luxury of occasional escape. She turned her back on the green distance. "Shall we not go back to where the music is playing?" she said.
"There really is no necessity; he is perfectly happy with the paper." Perhaps he was, though the paper was a half-penny morning one; he did not make extravagant demands on fate, or anything else; nevertheless, Julia went down. The Polkingtons' house was furnished on an ascending scale, which found its zenith in the drawing-room, but deteriorated again very rapidly afterwards.
That day had been an important one to the Polkingtons; Violet, the eldest of the sisters, had that afternoon accepted an offer of marriage from the Reverend Richard Frazer. The young man had not left the house an hour, and Mrs. Polkington was not yet returned from some afternoon engagement more than half, but already the matter had been in part discussed by the family.
But perhaps you'll be back before winter comes round again?" "I don't know when I shall be back," was all Julia could find to say. The idea of being missed like this was new and strange to her; the Polkingtons' feelings were so much guided by what was advisable, or expedient, that there was not usually much room for simple emotions.
Polkington said, as if stray guests to lunch were the most usual and convenient thing in the world. The Polkingtons kept up a good many of their farces in private life; most of them found it easier, as well as pleasanter, to do so. "The cold beef," Mrs.
But" with a little glint of self-derision "Heaven knows better than to send those sort of easy ways to the Polkingtons; they are ill-conditioned beasts who only behave when they are properly laden by fate, and not often then. Now you know all about it, so won't you say good-bye and go?" "I don't know about it and, what is more, I don't care.
He had stayed nearly a week, and in that time taken a great fancy to her. In those first bad days after the Captain's leaving the army, the Polkingtons had lived, or perhaps more accurately, drifted about, a good deal abroad. It was then that Julia picked up her only accomplishment, a working knowledge of several languages.
Great-aunt Jane was one of the relations the Polkingtons did not use; she was not rich enough or obliging enough to give any help, nor grand enough for conversational purposes. She never figured in Mrs. Polkington's talk except vaguely as "one of my husband's people in Norfolk;" this when she was explaining that the Captain came of East Anglian stock on his mother's side.
The Polkingtons had had to, and also to put an immense amount of thought and work into it, because they were bound to get a fine effect for a small expense, and that is not possible without a large outlay of time and consideration. Julia did not explain this to the present company, it would have been rather incomprehensible to them.
Rawson-Clew was not a personal friend of the Polkingtons, and he was not a man in an inferior position who might presume upon his loan to the Captain to establish a friendly footing. On the contrary, he was in a superior position, so much so that for a moment Julia was at a loss to understand how he came to accommodate her father.
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