Curious, by the way, that Imogen, who as a girl had declared solemnly
one day at Timothy's that she would never marry a good man--they were so
dull--should have married Jack Cardigan, in whom health had so destroyed
all traces of original sin, that she might have retired to rest with ten
thousand other Englishmen without knowing the difference from the one
she had chosen to repose beside. "Oh!" she would say of him, in her
"amusing" way, "Jack keeps himself so fearfully fit; he's never had
a day's illness in his life. He went right through the War without a
finger-ache. You really can't imagine how fit he is!" Indeed, he was
so "fit" that he couldn't see when she was flirting, which was such a
comfort in a way. All the same she was quite fond of him, so far as one
could be of a sports-machine, and of the two little Cardigans made after
his pattern. Her eyes just then were comparing him maliciously with
Prosper Profond. There was no "small" sport or game which Monsieur
Profond had not played at too, it seemed, from skittles to
tarpon-fishing, and worn out every one. Imogen would sometimes wish that
they had worn out Jack, who continued to play at them and talk of them
with the simple zeal of a school-girl learning hockey; at the age of
Great-uncle Timothy she well knew that Jack would be playing carpet golf
in her bedroom, and "wiping somebody's eye."
He was telling them now how he had "pipped the pro--a charmin' fellow,
playin' a very good game," at the last hole this morning; and how he
had pulled down to Caversham since lunch, and trying to incite Prosper
Profond to play him a set of tennis after tea--do him good--"keep him
fit.
"But what's the use of keepin' fit?" said Monsieur Profond.
"Yes, sir," murmured Michael Mont, "what do you keep fit for?"
"Jack," cried Imogen, enchanted, "what do you keep fit for?"
Jack Cardigan stared with all his health. The questions were like the
buzz of a mosquito, and he put up his hand to wipe them away. During the
War, of course, he had kept fit to kill Germans; now that it was over
he either did not know, or shrank in delicacy from explanation of his
moving principle.
"But he's right," said Monsieur Profond unexpectedly, "there's nothin'
left but keepin' fit."
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."