"What business had I to go off like that!" And he moved very slowly to
the glass. What a cadaverous chap! Her voice, behind him, murmured:
"You mustn't come down, Uncle; you must rest."
"Fiddlesticks! A glass of champagne'll soon set me to rights. I can't
have you missing the opera."
But the journey down the corridor was troublesome. What carpets they
had in these newfangled places, so thick that you tripped up in them at
every step! In the lift he noticed how concerned she looked, and said
with the ghost of a twinkle:
"I'm a pretty host."
When the lift stopped he had to hold firmly to the seat to prevent its
slipping under him; but after soup and a glass of champagne he felt
much better, and began to enjoy an infirmity which had brought such
solicitude into her manner towards him.
"I should have liked you for a daughter," he said suddenly; and watching
the smile in her eyes, went on:
"You mustn't get wrapped up in the past at your time of life; plenty of
that when you get to my age. That's a nice dress--I like the style."
"I made it myself."
Ah! A woman who could make herself a pretty frock had not lost her
interest in life.
"Make hay while the sun shines," he said; "and drink that up. I want to
see some colour in your cheeks. We mustn't waste life; it doesn't do.
There's a new Marguerite to-night; let's hope she won't be fat. And
Mephisto--anything more dreadful than a fat chap playing the Devil I
can't imagine."
But they did not go to the opera after all, for in getting up from
dinner the dizziness came over him again, and she insisted on his
staying quiet and going to bed early. When he parted from her at the
door of the hotel, having paid the cabman to drive her to Chelsea, he
sat down again for a moment to enjoy the memory of her words: "You are
such a darling to me, Uncle Jolyon!" Why! Who wouldn't be! He would
have liked to stay up another day and take her to the Zoo, but two
days running of him would bore her to death. No, he must wait till next
Sunday; she had promised to come then. They would settle those lessons
for Holly, if only for a month. It would be something. That little
Mam'zelle Beauce wouldn't like it, but she would have to lump it. And
crushing his old opera hat against his chest he sought the lift.
He drove to Waterloo next morning, struggling with a desire to say:
'Drive me to Chelsea.' But his sense of proportion was too strong.
Besides, he still felt shaky, and did not want to risk another
aberration like that of last night, away from home. Holly, too, was
expecting him, and what he had in his bag for her. Not that there was
any cupboard love in his little sweet--she was a bundle of affection.
Then, with the rather bitter cynicism of the old, he wondered for a
second whether it was not cupboard love which made Irene put up with
him. No, she was not that sort either. She had, if anything, too little
notion of how to butter her bread, no sense of property, poor thing!
Besides, he had not breathed a word about that codicil, nor should
he--sufficient unto the day was the good thereof.