Part 21 (1/2)

Philip is well in the room now, and any moment may see them.

”Would it not look well to attract his attention; sign to him. He is bound to spot you in a minute. Here is the waiter, we will send him.

Waiter! go and ask that tall gentleman to come here. Say two ladies wish to speak to him.”

Mr. Roche advances in surprise. He is vastly annoyed to find his wife again in company with Mrs. Mounteagle.

”You did not expect to see me, Philip,” she says, a.s.suming an air of gaiety to cover her confusion.

”I discovered your wife at our mutual costumier's in Bond Street,”

cries Giddy. ”I know she always starves herself when shopping alone in town, so persuaded her to make a good lunch with me. I have known her to exist a whole day on prawns and ices, or Bath buns with lemonade.

So you owe me a debt of grat.i.tude, Mr. Roche. We are lucky in having ran across you, and two other friends,” as Philip's eyes fall on Carol Quinton and the insipid Bertie. ”We are simply gobbling our food whole, as we are going to the International Fur Store. I want to try and get a m.u.f.f of leopard's skin to match my cape, for which, alas! I have still to write a cheque. But we are keeping you standing, and Mr.

Eccott is waiting for his guest.”

”Don't be late home, Eleanor,” he says, ”it gets very cold and foggy, and you still have a cough.”

The two women watch him move away, then their eyes meet.

”You are a brick, Giddy,” gasps Mrs. Roche, squeezing her hand under the table. ”What makes you so splendidly loyal to me?”

”Life is so short, dear, it is well to be kind when we can. Besides, I am very fond of you though we did quarrel. I think it will draw us closer together.”

”I shall never forget what you have done for me to-day.”

As the four friends leave the restaurant Carol Quinton bends over Giddy, and says sincerely:

”Bravo! and thanks a thousand times. You acted to perfection.”

”Glad you think so,” she replies in an undertone; ”and, my friend, _you_ can go to the fur store now, and settle my little account.”

She pointed to her cloak as she spoke, and added saucily:

”The m.u.f.f can stand over until the next time.”

”So you have made it up with the Mounteagle woman,” says Philip that evening, pulling fiercely at his moustache.

”Well, you see, it was _so_ difficult not to, meeting at the dressmaker's. I can't describe to you how awkwardly I was placed. I have felt more uncomfortable to-day than I have done for years. She practically took me by storm, and was so kind and nice it quite touched me. I have gone back to my old opinion of her. She may be a little hot-tempered, but means well.”

”It is a thousand pities. I hoped you had done with her for good. I don't like you going to the Savoy with her dressed up in that gaudy fas.h.i.+on. She looks quite remarkable and unladylike. Besides that fellow Quinton is always at her heels, and I have heard some strange things about him. But then he is just the style of man people like the widow affect.”

”What have you heard about Mr. Quinton?”

”Oh, never mind; nothing for your ears, my dear.”

”Here is the post,” says Eleanor with a sigh of relief. She is glad for the introduction of letters to turn the subject.

”Only one for me,” turning the envelope over. ”I really dare not open it.”