you?" demanded James abruptly, with effect of rudeness, but rather as one striving to solve perplexing enigma.
Upon which Zella replied very seriously, in St. Craye's favourite catchword of the moment:
"It means a great deal to me."
James still continued to gaze at her with a frowning perplexity that oddly recalled the dogmatic sulky schoolboy at Boscombe.
'Why do you play?" he demanded suddenly.
Zella flushed scarlet, was angry with herself for flushing and could find no reply that would not betray either mortification or fury.
At last she said feebly, with a feeling that she must either speak or dissolve into scalding tears:
"Why not? Don't you play?"
James's face cleared abruptly, and Zella, with her odd insight, guessed that he suddenly felt himself to be comforting and reassuring the hurt vanity of an angry mortified child.
"Good gracious, no! I gave it up when I heard real music. And my fingers aren't bits of quicksilver like yours, either. I couldn't tackle all those runs and shakes and things, and I can't imagine how you do it."
It was the small glittering toy held out to pacify the discomfited child.
"Then, you do not play at all?" murmured Mdlle. de Kervoyou, still intent on the nearly completed sock.
"I only play tennis," laughed James. "Will you have a single to-morrow, Zella?"
For the rest of her cousin's short visit, Zella was the bright, fresh, outdoor maiden of English fiction, and discovered half a dozen charming new poses in which to view herself, garbed in a short white skirt and cotton blouse and swinging a tennis racquet.
XXV
IN the course of that summer Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, thankfully relinquishing possession of the London flat which had served its purpose so well as regarded Muriel, decided that neither Providence nor her brother-in-law were exerting themselves sufficiently on Zella's behalf.
To think, with Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, was to act.
"Henry," she said, "I have a good mind to spend a couple of nights at Villetswood on our way home."
"It isn't on our way, dear."
"You need not pick my words to pieces in that carping manner, Henry dear. I do not say that Devonshire is on the direct line between London and Boscombe; but one cannot say a duty is ever out of one's way, after all, and it does seem to me a most clear duty to see that' poor little Zella is given a chance."
"A chance of what?"
"Why insist on putting things into words, Henry? Surely you know the kind of thing I mean: whom does she ever meet at Villetswood, where there is not another house within miles? You may tell me Louis brings her to spend a week in London every now and then; but mark my words, Henry, a week here and there does not make things happen."
"I suppose not," said Henry doubtfully.
"What is Villetswood for, I should like to know," demanded his wife with increasing warmth, "if not to have people staying there, now that the child is growing up? I feel bound to speak to Louis about it sooner or later, and you know, Henry, what I always say is, Never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day."
Henry made no reply to this electrifying axiom, and Mrs. Lloyd-Evans said with gentle reproachfulness:
"You are not very sympathetic, darling, but Zella has always looked upon me as a second mother, as you. know, and I cannot fail her now, just at the most crucial moment in a girl's life. If necessary, I will offer to go and act hostess myself at Villetswood, so that Louis can have a nice amusing little house-party there for Zella's birthday."
"It is very good of you, my dear, but you know how much you dislike entertaining, and, after all, there is that sister of his always there."
"My dear Henry! what are you thinking of? A Frenchwoman is not at all the sort of person whom one could have as hostess at a house-party for young people. You know how very lax foreign ideas always are, and one has heard some very strange stories indeed."
"Not of that old sheep, Marianne!"
Mrs. Lloyd-Evans smiled with a mixture of reproof and tolerance—reproof at Henry's unseemly analogy, and tolerance since it. was only applied to a foreigner.
"No, dear, not that I know of," she said darkly, with a veiled intimation that there might be much of which she did not, and had better not, know. "But you can see for yourself how unsuitable it would be, apart from the fact that the poor thing would probably be quite bewildered by a large party, since she cannot have seen anything of the sort in that tiny Paris flat—their drawing-room not more than half the size of this room, and most of it taken up with that huge embroidery frame of hers. It would be quite out of the question; and as to my disliking having to entertain, which I certainly do, that is not to be weighed in the balance for a moment, Henry, when it is a clear question of right and wrong, as you agree with me that this is."
"Well, my dear, it is very good of you," said Henry sincerely, Mrs. Lloyd-Evans's eloquence having by this time succeeded in persuading them both that she was the victim of an unescapable duty.
Louis did not view the matter in the same light, when his sister-in-law, led, as she piously supposed, by the hand of Providence, unexpectedly encountered him that very afternoon in Piccadilly, and was enabled to cause the divergence of a considerable stream of pedestrians by earnestly expounding her views to him then and there.
"It is most remarkable, Louis, that you and I, of all people, should meet here and now. I can hardly believe it, though really what I always say is, that London is not such a very large place, after all, since one is constantly running up against someone."
"I am afraid several people are running up against us now, Marianne. Which way are you going?"
"I am going through the Park, because at any rate there are trees of a sort there, and it always makes one think of the country, though the poor things are black instead of green, and have no leaves to speak of. But I dare say you know what I mean."
Louis did.
"But it really is the most curious coincidence possible," pursued his sister-in-law, her active mind again springing to this remarkable aspect of the case. "Will you believe it, Louis, it was only this morning that Henry and I were talking of you, and wishing we could discuss these new plans with you!"
"That was very kind of you. But what new plans, unless you mean my being in London to-day, which was quite unexpected?"
"No, Louis, certainly not. I never ask questions, as you know, and I should not dream of even wondering what on earth can have brought you all the way to London in this mysterious manner, without even letting us know you were coming, and asking us for lunch at the flat, which you could so easily have done."
"As a matter of fact, I thought you were leaving the flat for good this week."
"So
