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Updated: July 23, 2025
A distant relative, an old and feeble lady who has passed her life in a little Dorsetshire village, came to see us in April, and in less than a fortnight she was seized with illness and died. Then Fanny had an attack of bronchitis, from which even now she is not altogether recovered. On her account we are all going to Royat, and I think we shall be away until the end of September.
A fortnight later, she wrote from Royat to Sylvia Moorhouse. It was a long epistle, full of sunny descriptions, breathing renewed vigour of body and mind. The last paragraph ran thus: 'Yesterday was my birthday; I was twenty-eight. At this age, it is wisdom in a woman to remind herself that youth is over. I don't regret it; let it go with all its follies!
"Well?" she said after a pause. "I came over to Royat, this morning," said Lackaday, "to call on you and bid you good-bye." "Why?" she asked in a low voice. "It appeared to be ordinary courtesy." "Was there anything particular you wanted to say to me?" "Perhaps to supplement just the little I could tell you yesterday afternoon." "Captain Hylton supplemented it after you left.
Perhaps she did me injustice, but such a thing had never entered her mind engaged as it was with puzzlement over Lackaday. When people are afflicted with fixed ideas, they grow perhaps telepathic. Otherwise she could not account for her certainty that I could give her some information. She knew that I would not write. What was a flying visit a night's journey to Royat?
My innocence had been too bland for my worldly years. My evasions had proclaimed me suspect. My criticism of Royat made my fear of a chance visit from her so obvious. My polite hope that I should see her in Paris on my way back, rubbed in it.
We entered the park, found an empty bench beneath the trees and sat down, Auriol between us. She said: "Do you mean at Royat or in the world in general?" "Perhaps the latter." She laughed queerly. "As chance has thrown us together here, it will possibly do the same somewhere else." "My sphere isn't yours," said he.
We did all sorts of other things. We stopped at wild mountain gorges alive with the rustle of water and aglow with wild-flowers. We went on foot through one-streeted, tumble-down villages and passed the time of day with the kindly inhabitants. And the August sun shone all the time. We reached Royat at about six o'clock and went straight up to our rooms.
"I offered to accompany them to Royat tomorrow, and they accepted my offer. "Chatel-Guyon is less sad than I thought on my arrival. "July 23d. Day spent at Royat. Royat is a little patch of hotels at the bottom of a valley, at the gate of Clermont-Ferrand. A great many people there. A large park full of life. Superb view of the Puyde-Dome, seen at the end of a perspective of valleys.
Passing through Paris, and staying a few days at Fontainebleau, they went on to Clermont-Ferrand in Auvergne, and to Royat, then newly come into vogue as a health resort.
And then I remembered having seen the name on the last week's bill, printed in the great eighteen inch letters which were now devoted to Les Petit Patou. Next week Lackaday would be the star turn. But still... I went back to Royat feeling miserable. I was not elated by finding a letter from Lady Auriol which had been forwarded from my St. James's Street chambers.
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