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Rh You can have ten guesses each, and you would never come right, for it can’t be a common name. It was Miss Jackdaw. Crowe: Jackdaw. I never heard anything like that, and if you ask the Colonel about it, he’ll confirm every word I’ve said. Boucher, Weston, why that’s quite commonplace in comparison, and I'm sure that’s an event enough for me."

Lucia gave her silvery laugh.

“Dear Mrs Weston,” she said, “you must really tell me at once when the happy day will be. Peppino and I are thinking of going to the Riviera –”

Georgie broke in.

“You shan’t do anything of the kind,” he said. “What’s to happen to us? ’Oo very selfish, Lucia.”

The conversation broke up again into duets and trios, and Lucia could have a private conversation with her host. But half-an-hour ago, so Georgie reflected, they had all been walking round each other like dogs going on tiptoe with their tails very tightly curled, and growling gently to themselves, aware that a hasty snap, or the breach of the smallest observance of etiquette, might lead to a general quarrel. But now they all had the reward of their icy politenesses: there was no more ice, except on their plates, and the politeness was not a matter of etiquette. At present, they might be considered a republic, but no one knew what was going to happen after dinner. Not a word had been said about the tableaux.

Lucia dropped her voice as she spoke to him,