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Ronnie Carteret was the subject of a good deal of chaff that night at mess. The Rajah was being entertained, and he was the only man who paid the young officer any compliments on the matter of his achievement on the racecourse. Everyone else openly declared that the horse, and not its rider, was the one to be congratulated. "Never saw anything so ludicrous in my life," one critic said.
I make you a present of that for your next temperance meeting. Now let's go out and buck Ronnie up. Remember, he'll feel jolly flat for a bit, with no temperature. Temperature is a thing you miss, when it has become a habit." Ronnie saw Dick off by the mid-day train.
But I'll tell you this: If I thought it would be for her real happiness, and could be pulled through, I would tell her I did it; then find Airth to-morrow and tell him I had told her so." "Ass!" said Ronnie, affectionately. "As if that could mend matters. Don't you know the earl? He was against the hushing-up business from the first.
Thus she sat watching the tennis with a little smile of content on her sweet face. "She is beginning to forget," thought Ronnie, exultant. "My 'vantage!" he shouted significantly to Billy, over the net. "Deuce!" responded Billy, smashing down the ball with unnecessary violence. "No!" cried Ronnie. "Outside, my boy! Game and a 'love' set to me!"
If we could get off in a fortnight, we might be back early in November; anyway, in plenty of time for Christmas." "Why do you say 'we, darling?" "Why not say 'we'? We always do, don't we?" "Yes, dear. For three happy years it has always been 'we, in everything. We have not been parted for longer than twelve hours at a time, Ronnie.
"Because it is a hundred and fifty years old; and because you have to be so careful not to bump its head, when you carry it about." Helen put her hand to her throat. "I think it is a foolish name for a violoncello," she said, coldly. "Not at all," explained Ronnie. "It seems to me more appropriate every day.
One usually says: 'Did it? 'Is it then? or 'Was it? But I almost think present conditions require a more definite statement of fact. I fancy one would say: 'How do you do, baby? I am your papa! ... This way, Ronnie, in my own old nurseries. Oh, darling, I am afraid I am going to cry! But you must not mind. They will only be tears of unutterable joy.
The exquisite rise and fall of harmony, came not again. Bitterly disappointed, Ronnie waited, staring into the mirror. But a rather weary, very lonely, and exceedingly modern young man stared back at him. At last he realised that he could no longer play the 'cello by inspiration. So he began very carefully feeling for the notes.
He looked like a superior valet or upper footman, in a bowler and a black morning coat. He was just out of earshot; but his presence prevented Ronnie from feeling himself alone with Helen, and increased the careful caution with which he took his bearings. At last he felt the moment had arrived to stop Helen's well-meant attempts at amusing him.
The tears were running down her cheeks. She looked full into his earnest eyes. "Oh, Ronnie, you do look different! You do look your own dear self. Oh, Ronnie, my own! But Dick is coming back to-morrow. He went up to town only this morning. He will tell us what to do. Till then, don't you think we had better just talk about the sea, and the little houses, and and how happy we are?"
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