"It's a real business, and she has to live by it. Sometimes it's a
worry."

"But a business of her own!" She surveyed the confusion of his
visage with a sweet intelligence. "Is it an amusing sort of
business, Mr. Prothero?"

Prothero looked mulish. "My mother is a dressmaker," he said. "In
Brixton. She doesn't do particularly badly--or well. I live on my
scholarship. I have lived on scholarships since I was thirteen.
And you see, Lady Marayne, Brixton is a poor hunting country."

Lady Marayne felt she had unmasked Prothero almost indecently.
Whatever happened there must be no pause. There must be no sign of
a hitch.

"But it's good at tennis," she said. "You DO play tennis, Mr.
Prothero?"

"I--I gesticulate," said Prothero.

Lady Marayne, still in flight from that pause, went off at a
tangent.

"Poff, my dear," she said, "I've had a diving-board put at the deep
end of the pond."

The remark hung unanswered for a moment. The transition had been
too quick for Benham's state of mind.