Looking out of the drawing-room window, for the tenth time at least,
Mountjoy at last saw Iris in the street, returning to the house.
She brought the maid with her into the drawing-room, in the gayest of
good spirits, and presented Rhoda to Mountjoy.
"What a blessing a good long walk is, if we only knew it!" she
exclaimed. "Look at my little maid's colour! Who would suppose that she
came here with heavy eyes and pale cheeks? Except that she loses her
way in the town, whenever she goes out alone, we have every reason to
congratulate ourselves on our residence at Honeybuzzard. The doctor is
Rhoda's good genius, and the doctor's wife is her fairy godmother."
Mountjoy's courtesy having offered the customary congratulations, the
maid was permitted to retire; and Iris was free to express her
astonishment at the friendly relations established (by means of the
dinner-table) between the two most dissimilar men on the face of
creation.
"There is something overwhelming," she declared, "in the bare idea of
your having asked him to dine with you--on such a short acquaintance,
and being such a man! I should like to have peeped in, and seen you
entertaining your guest with the luxuries of the hotel larder.
Seriously, Hugh, your social sympathies have taken a range for which I
was not prepared. After the example that you have set me, I feel
ashamed of having doubted whether Mr. Vimpany was worthy of his
charming wife. Don't suppose that I am ungrateful to the doctor! He has
found his way to my regard, after what he has done for Rhoda. I only
fail to understand how he has possessed himself of your sympathies."
So she ran on, enjoying the exercise of her own sense of humour in
innocent ignorance of the serious interests which she was deriding.
Mountjoy tried to stop her, and tried in vain.
"No, no," she persisted as mischievously as ever, "the subject is too
interesting to be dismissed. I am dying to know how you and your guest
got through the dinner. Did he take more wine than was good for him?
And, when he forgot his good manners, did he set it all right again by
saying, 'No offence,' and passing the bottle?"
Hugh could endure it no longer. "Pray control your high spirits for a
moment," he said. "I have news for you from home."
Those words put an end to her outbreak of gaiety, in an instant.
"News from my father?" she asked.