Page:The Climber (Benson).djvu/87

Rh For Brixham would be very empty during August, and she wanted Edgar Brayton to feel dull. Following out his own plan, he had been extremely neighbourly with his county town, and she wished him to find few with whom it was possible to be neighbourly for a few weeks. He had come to both the alternate Tuesdays in July, and had continued to be growingly attentive to her. She wanted to give him the opportunity of making up his mind during a month when he would have few distractions. And in particular she did not want him, after what he had said, to have the distraction of Maud. She wished for his undivided attention.

At the present moment, at any rate, she was getting it. He had come to lunch, since she had ascertained that he had business in Brixham that would occupy him till a quarter to two, and she had received him with a charming "frolic welcome."

"Aunt Elizabeth isn't in," she had said; "but there is cold lamb and Aunt Cathie and me. Or is it I? And I bought a box of cigarettes, and you should have seen the tobacconist in the High Street stare at me, as if I had committed some unspeakable crime in asking for them. I suppose he thought I was going to smoke them myself. Oh, and thank you so much for the first edition of Omar you lent me. Lots of the lines are different in the later edition, and I don't think they are improvements generally, do you? No, don't put your hat down on the gong, please. Have you ever had lunch in so small a house?"

Lunch had been more than successful. Lucia had broken up the lettuce for the salad with her hands, explaining that to touch it with a knife made it taste steely, and had made coffee for him afterwards in the Turkish fashion. There had been no pudding, for she distrusted, from experience, the pastry of the godly Mrs. Inglis, but he had eaten eggs in aspic, cold lamb and salad, biscuits and cheese, and some late cherries gathered from the garden, followed by coffee. Lucia, in fact, had gauged him with a supreme accuracy; she knew that the food was simple and excellent, and knew that he would be pleased at its excellence, and pride himself on his own appreciation of the spirit that directed its simplicity. He would lunch well, and be delighted at his own good taste in liking the absence of parade. For he had lunched, as Lucia knew, being a guest, with Mrs. Wilson, who had covered many dishes with brown sauce; and he had lunched, as Lucia knew, being a guest, with Mrs. Vereker, where there was corked champagne disguised as "cup" in a thick sort of stew of