Page:The Berkeleys and their neighbors.djvu/238

 studyin' 'bout de Berkeleys, 'kase dey got dat high an' mighty sperrit dey lay down an' starve 'fo' dey disqualify deyselfs by wukkin'."

But Olivia stuck bravely to her plebeian amusement. On this particular afternoon she was not hoeing. She was merely snipping off straggling wisps from the great rose-trees—old-fashioned "maiden's blush," and damasks. She was thinking, as, indeed, she generally did when she found herself employed in that way, of Pembroke and that unlucky afternoon six years ago.

Before she knew it Pembroke was advancing up the garden walk. In a moment they were shaking hands with a great assumption of friendliness. Olivia could not but wonder if he remembered the similarity between that and just such another spring afternoon in the same place. Pembroke looked remarkably well and seemed in high spirits.

"The Colonel was out riding—and I did not need Pete's directions to know that you were very likely pottering among your flowers at this time."

"Pottering is such a senile kind of a word—you make me feel I am in my dotage. Doddering is the next step to pottering. And this, I remember, is the first chance I have had to congratulate you in person on your speech. Papa gives your father and your grandfather the whole credit. I asked him, however, when he wrote you to give my congratulations."

"Which he did. It was a very cold and clammy way of felicitating a friend."