The luncheon went on, and was soon over, and coffee and cigarettes were served. All the women smoked with the exception of Maryllia, Cicely and old Miss Fosby. The rings of pale blue vapour circled before Maryllia's eyes in a dim cloud,--she had seen the same kind of mixed smoking going on before, scores of times, and yet now--why was it that she felt vaguely annoyed by a sense of discrepancy and vulgarity She could not tell. Cicely watched her lovingly,--and every now and again Julian Adderley, waving away the smoke of his own cigar with one hand, studied her face and tried to fathom its expression. She spoke but little, and that chiefly to Lord Charlemont who was on her left-hand side.
"And how long are you going to stay in this jolly old place, Miss Vancourt?" he asked.
"All my life, I hope,"--she said with a little smile--"It is my own home, you know."
"Oh yes!--I know!--but--" he hesitated for a moment; "But your aunt- --"
"Aunt Emily and I don't quite agree,"--said Maryllia, quietly--"She has been very kind to me in the past,--but since Uncle Fred's death, things have not been just as pleasant. You see, I speak frankly. Besides I'm getting on towards thirty,--it's time I lived my own life, and tried to do something useful."
Charlemont laughed.
"You look more like eighteen than thirty,"--he said--"Why give yourself away?"
"Is that giving myself away?" and she raised her eyebrows quizzically--"I'm not thirty yet--I'm twenty-seven,--but that's old enough to begin to take things seriously. I've made up my mind to live here at Abbot's Manor and do all I can for the tenantry and the village generally--I'm sure I shall be perfectly happy." "How about getting married?" he queried.
Her blue eyes darkened with a shade of offence.
"The old story!" she said--"Men always think a woman must be married to be happy. It doesn't at all follow. I know heaps and heaps of married women, and they are in anything but an enviable state. I would not change with one of them!"
"Would you like to be another Miss Fosby?" he suggested in a mirthful undertone.
She smiled.
"Well--no! But I would rather be Miss Fosby than Lady Wicketts!"
Here she rose, giving the signal for general adjournment to the drawing-room. The windows of this apartment were set open, and a charming garden vista of lawn and terraee and rose-walk opened out before the eyes.