The saying, too deep for Sunday afternoon, would have passed unanswered,
but for the mercurial nature of young Mont.

"Good!" he cried. "That's the great discovery of the War. We all
thought we were progressing--now we know we're only changing."

"For the worse," said Monsieur Profond genially.

"How you are cheerful, Prosper!" murmured Annette.

"You come and play tennis!" said Jack Cardigan; "you've got the hump.
We'll soon take that down. D'you play, Mr. Mont?"

"I hit the ball about, sir."

At this juncture Soames rose, ruffled in that deep instinct of
preparation for the future which guided his existence.

"When Fleur comes--" he heard Jack Cardigan say.

Ah! and why didn't she come? He passed through drawing-room, hall, and
porch out on to the drive, and stood there listening for the car. All was
still and Sundayfied; the lilacs in full flower scented the air. There
were white clouds, like the feathers of ducks gilded by the sunlight.
Memory of the day when Fleur was born, and he had waited in such agony
with her life and her mother's balanced in his hands, came to him
sharply. He had saved her then, to be the flower of his life. And now!
was she going to give him trouble--pain--give him trouble? He did not
like the look of things! A blackbird broke in on his reverie with an
evening song--a great big fellow up in that acacia-tree. Soames had
taken quite an interest in his birds of late years; he and Fleur would
walk round and watch them; her eyes were sharp as needles, and she knew
every nest. He saw her dog, a retriever, lying on the drive in a patch
of sunlight, and called to him. "Hallo, old fellow-waiting for her too!"
The dog came slowly with a grudging tail, and Soames mechanically laid a
pat on his head. The dog, the bird, the lilac, all were part of Fleur for
him; no more, no less. 'Too fond of her!' he thought, 'too fond!' He
was like a man uninsured, with his ships at sea. Uninsured again--as in
that other time, so long ago, when he would wander dumb and jealous in
the wilderness of London, longing for that woman--his first wife--the
mother of this infernal boy. Ah! There was the car at last! It drew
up, it had luggage, but no Fleur.

"Miss Fleur is walking up, sir, by the towing-path."

Walking all those miles? Soames stared. The man's face had the
beginning of a smile on it. What was he grinning at? And very quickly
he turned, saying, "All right, Sims!" and went into