"Oh, I know it turns out that way sometimes," assented Reginald.
"Forbidden fizz is often the sweetest."

But the remark was wasted on the Princess, who preferred champagne
that had at least a suggestion of dissolved barley-sugar.

"I hope you will come and see me again," she said, in a tone that
prevented the hope from becoming too infectious; adding as a happy
afterthought, "you must come to stay with us in the country."

Her particular part of the country was a few hundred versts the
other side of Tamboff, with some fifteen miles of agrarian
disturbance between her and the nearest neighbour. Reginald felt
that there is some privacy which should be sacred from intrusion.



THE RETICENCE OF LADY ANNE



Egbert came into the large, dimly lit drawing-room with the air of a
man who is not certain whether he is entering a dovecote or a bomb
factory, and is prepared for either eventuality. The little
domestic quarrel over the luncheon-table had not been fought to a
definite finish, and the question was how far Lady Anne was in a
mood to renew or forgo hostilities. Her pose in the arm-chair by
the tea-table was rather elaborately rigid; in the gloom of a
December afternoon Egbert's pince-nez did not materially help him to
discern the expression of her face.