Page:Belloc Lowndes--The chink in the armour.djvu/269

Rh doorway. He looked more good-tempered than usual, and as they walked in he chatted pleasantly to Chester.

"This way," he said, importantly. "Do not trouble to go into the salon, Madame! We shall have tea here, of course."

And Sylvia Bailey was amused, as well as rather touched, to see the preparations which had been made in the little dining-room for the entertainment of Bill Chester and of herself.

In the middle of the round table which had looked so bare yesterday was a bowl of white roses—roses that had never grown in the untidy garden outside. Two dessert dishes were heaped up with delicious cakes—the cakes for which French pastrycooks are justly famed. There was also a basin full of the Alpine strawberries which Sylvia loved, and of which she always ordered a goodly supply at the Villa du Lac. Madame Wachner had even remembered to provide the thick cream, which, to a foreign taste, spoils the delicate flavour of strawberries.

They were really very kind people, these Wachners!

Looking round the funny little dining-room, Sylvia could not help remembering how uncomfortable she had felt when sitting there alone the day before. It was hard now to believe that she should have had that queer, eerie feeling of discomfort and disquietude in such a commonplace, cheerful room. She told herself that there probably had been some little creature hidden there—some shy, wild thing, which maybe had crept in out of the wood.

"And now I will go and make the tea," said Madame Wachner pleasantly, and Sylvia gaily insisted on accompanying her hostess into the kitchen.