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In the first place, he liked her appearance, he liked her brisk, frank manner; and then, is n't it always well to have a friend near the rose? The result was that when she and Susanna were alone, Miss Sandus succinctly remarked, "My dear, your cousin is a trump." The shadows were long, as he and Adrian strolled back to Craford Old Manor.
They were in the billiard-room, after luncheon. Miss Sandus was sipping coffee, while Susanna, cue in hand, more or less absently knocked about the balls. So that their remarks were punctuated by an erratic series of ivory toc-tocs. "I 'm afraid if I own up," she answered, "there won't be any happy day.
"Yes, there's that to be thought of." "There 's such a deuced lot of things to be thought of," said he, despairingly. "Let's hear the deuced lot," said the lady, with business-like cheerfulness. "Well, to begin with," he brought out painfully, "there 's the fact that she 's rich." "Yes, she's rich," conceded Miss Sandus. "Does that diminish her attractions?"
"If flattery can make friends, you 'll not lack 'em," said she, with a pretty, pleased old blush. "But I 've not yet emptied my sack," said he, relapsing into gloom. "There's a further and perhaps a greater difficulty." "Let's hear the further difficulty," cheerily proposed Miss Sandus. Then, as he appeared to hesitate, "Has it anything to do with her former marriage?"
Miss Sandus, who met them in the hall, insisted that Susanna must go upstairs and change; but to Anthony she said, "There 'll be tea in a minute or two," and led the way to the drawing-room, the big, oblong, sombre red-and-gold drawing-room, with its heavy furniture, its heavy red damask hangings, its heavy gilded woodwork, its heavy bronzes and paintings.
You call that young?" he asked, with the inflection of one who was open to be convinced. Adrian bridled. "You deliberately put a false construction on my words. I was alluding to Miss Sandus, as you 're perfectly well aware. Madame Torrebianca is n't seventy-four, nor anything near it. She's not twenty-four. Say about twenty-five and a fraction. With such hair too and such frocks and eyes.
"For mercy's sake, don't," Miss Sandus implored her, starting. "I won't," Susanna promised, drawing a deep breath. "But you will admit I have some provocation. Must I must I see him?" "Must you?" cried Miss Sandus. "Are n't you dying to see him?" "Yes," Susanna confessed, with a flutter of laughter. "I 'm dying to see him. But I 'm so afraid." "I 'll disappear," said Miss Sandus, rising.
"I sometimes forget, my dear," Miss Sandus had improved the occasion to remark, "that you are not English; but the Italian in you comes out in your unconquerable passion for intrigue." The initial and principal paragraph of the letter ran as follows:
"And, anyhow, what's the good of possessing power, if you 're not to exercise and enjoy it?" The clock on the mantelpiece began to strike three. "Mr. Craford," announced a servant. Miss Sandus fled from the room by a French window. Susanna returned her cue to the rack.
On Tuesday she and Miss Sandus were his guests at dinner; on Wednesday he and Adrian were her guests at luncheon; on Thursday, at tea-time, they paid their visit of digestion; on Friday, the rain holding up for a few hours in the afternoon, he and Susanna went for a walk on the cliffs.
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