"What a beast of a day!"

It was an appalling day. January, that grim month, was treating
London with its usual severity. Early in the morning a bank of fog
had rolled up off the river, and was deepening from pearly white to a
lurid brown. It pressed on the window-pane like a blanket, leaving
dark, damp rivulets on the glass.

"Awful!" said Derek.

"Your mater's train will be late."

"Yes. Damned nuisance. It's bad enough meeting trains in any case,
without having to hang about a draughty station for an hour."

"And it's sure, I should imagine," went on Freddie, pursuing his
train of thought, "to make the dear old thing pretty tolerably ratty,
if she has one of those slow journeys." He pottered back to the
fireplace, and rubbed his shoulders reflectively against the
mantelpiece. "I take it that you wrote to her about Jill?"

"Of course. That's why she's coming over, I suppose. By the way, you
got those seats for that theatre tonight?"

"Yes. Three together and one somewhere on the outskirts. If it's all
the same to you, old thing, I'll have the one on the outskirts."

Derek, who had finished his kedgeree and was now making himself a
blot on Freddie's horizon with toast and marmalade, laughed.