t them so well, to put their heads together over
an afflicted bed of these flowers in quite another part of the garden,
and tell him what was the best treatment for their anaemic condition.
Pleasant and proper though it was to each of them that Mr. Wyse should
pay so little attention to the other, it was bitter as the endive salad
to both that he should tolerate, if not enjoy, the companionship which
the forwardness of Susan forced on him, and while they absently stared
at the fuchsias, the fire kindled, and Elizabeth spake with her tongue.

"How very plain poor Susan looks to-day," she said. "Such a colour,
though to be sure I attribute that more to what she ate and drank than
to anything else. Crimson. Oh, those poor fuchsias! I think I should
throw them away."

The common antagonism, Diva felt, had drawn her and Elizabeth into the
most cordial of understandings. For the moment she felt nothing but
enthusiastic sympathy with Elizabeth, in spite of her kingfisher-blue
gown.... What on earth, in parenthesis, was she to do with hers? She
could not give it to Janet: it was impossible to contemplate the idea of
Janet walking about the High Street in a tea-gown of kingfisher-blue
just in order to thwart Elizabeth....

"Mr. Wyse seems taken with her," said Diva. "How he can! Rather a snob.
M.B.E. She's always popping in here. Saw her yesterday going round the
corner of the street."

"What time, dear?" asked Elizabeth, nosing the scent.

"Middle of the morning."

"And I saw her in the afternoon," said Elizabeth. "That great lumbering
Rolls-Royce went tacking and skidding round the corner below my
garden-room."

"Was she in it?" asked Diva.

This appeared rather a slur on Elizabeth's reliability in observation.

"No, darling, she was sitting on the top," she said, taking the edge off
the sarcasm, in case Diva had not intended to be critical, by a little
laugh. Diva drew the conclusion that Elizabeth had actually seen her
inside.

"Think it's serious?" she said. "Think he'll marry her?"

The idea of course, repellent and odious as it was, had occurred to
Elizabeth, so she instantly denied it.

"Oh, you busy little match-maker," she said brightly. "Such an idea
never entered my head. You shouldn't make such fun of dear Susan. Come,
dear, I can't look at fuchsias any more. I must be getting home and must
say good-bye--au reservoir, rather--to Mr. Wyse, if Susan will allow me
to get a word in edgeways."

Susan see