said he to himself, 'it would have been called at least 'saucy'but Mammon's elect ones may do anything. Well—here I come, limping to my new tyrant's feet, like Goethe's bear to Lili's.'
She drew him away, as women only know how, from the rest of the party, who were chatting and laughing with Claude. She had shown off her fancied indifference to Lancelot before them, and now began in a softer voice,—
'Why will you be so shy and lonely, Mr. Smith?'
'Because I am not fit for your society.'
'Who tells you so? Why will you not become so?'
Lancelot hung down his head.
'As long as fish and game are your only society, you will become more and more morne and self-absorbed.'
'Really, fish were the last things of which I was thinking when you came. My whole heart was filled with the beauty of nature, and nothing else.'
There was an opening for one of Argemone's preconcerted orations.
'Had you no better occupation,' she said, gently, 'than nature, the first day of returning to the open air after so frightful and dangerous an accident? Were there no thanks due to One above?'
Lancelot understood her.
'How do you know that I was not even then showing my thankfulness?'
'What! with a cigar and a fishing-rod?'
'Certainly. Why not?'
