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The wind continues unaccommodating all night, and we see nothing, although we promised ourselves to have seen Gibraltar, or at least Tangiers, this morning, but we are disappointed of both. Tangiers reminded me of my old Antiquarian friend Auriol Hay Drummond, who is Consul there.
"Comprends pas," she shrugged at the boredom of literary allusion. "I don't see what all that has to do with Andre. I shall see, Mademoiselle, that he writes to his friends." "You will be doing them a great service, Madame," replied Auriol. There was a stiff silence.
But I was to confirm her right to dispose of the pups. I confirmed it solemnly. So we hastened to the stable yard and inspected the kennels, where the two mothers lay with their slithery tail-wagging broods. We discussed the points of each little beast and eventually decided on the one which should be Evadne's wedding present to General Lackaday and Lady Auriol Dayne.
She turned suddenly round on him, with a defiant flash of her brown eyes, which was one of her characteristics -the woman, for all her capable modernity, instinctively on the defensive. "It's only a fool who apologizes for doing a thing well," said Lackaday. "He couldn't do it well if he was a fool," Lady Auriol retorted. "You never know what a fool can do till you try him," said Lackaday.
As a matter of fact I was a very sick man, under the iron rule of doctors and nurses and such like oppressors; but, except to explain why I had lost touch with everybody, that is a matter of insignificant importance. The one or two letters I did receive from Lady Auriol did not stimulate my interest in The Romance.
I just sat and sweated and couldn't eat. She made me feel as if she was going to exhibit me as the fighting skeleton in her freak museum. If ever I see that woman coming towards me in the street, I'll turn tail and run like hell." I laughed. "You mustn't compare Mrs. Tankerville with Lady Auriol Dayne." "Mon Dieu! I should think not!" he cried with a fervent gesture. "Lady Auriol "
To Lady Auriol he talked mainly about the war, of which she appeared to have more complete information than he himself. "I suppose you think," she said at last with a swift side glance, "that I'm laying down the law about things I'm quite ignorant of." He said: "Not at all. You're in a position to judge much better than I. You people outside the wood can see it, in its entirety.
For Elodie's sake he had held himself in stern restraint, had uttered no word that might be interpreted as that of a lover. As far as Lady Auriol Dayne knew, as far as anyone on this earth knew, his feelings towards her were nothing more than those of a devoted and grateful friend. So does the well-intentioned ostrich, you may say, bury its head and imagine itself invisible.
But even to her I couldn't owe my position in the British Army." "Did you tell her so?" "I did." I pictured the scene, knowing my Auriol. I could see the pride in her dark eyes and masterful lips. His renunciation had in it that of the beau geste which she secretly adored. It put the final stamp on the man. Upon this little emotional outburst he left, promising to dine with me the next day.
If there was one social class which had the profoundest contempt for woman as an intelligent being it was the labouring population. For Heaven's sake remember, I am only giving you Lady Auriol's views, as expressed over the dinner table. What mine are, I won't say. Anyhow they don't amount to a row of pins. Lady Auriol continued her Jeremiad.
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