There's a mace used by a bishop, an ancestor of ours. He couldn't wield
a sword in battle, so he cottoned on to that, and in order to salve his
conscience before using it he would cry out 'Gare! gare!'--and they say
that's what our name comes from--see? 'Ware--Ware.' He was the founder
of our family--though, of course, he oughtn't to have been. And then we
have the duelling pistols my great-grandfather shot Lord Estcourt with.
They're beautiful things--in the case just as he left it after the duel,
with powder, balls, and caps, all complete. It's a romantic story--"

"My dear Dick," interposed Mrs. Ware, with fragile, uplifted hand,
"please don't offend us with these horrible family scandals. Katharine,
dear, are you going to the vicar's garden party this afternoon? If you
are, will you take a message to Mrs. Cook?"

So Katherine being monopolized, Dick was silenced, and as Austin and
Viviette were talking in a lively but unintelligible way about a thing,
or a play, or a horse called Nietzsche, he relapsed into the heavy,
full-blooded man's animal enjoyment of his food and the sensitive's
consciousness of heartache.

When the ladies had left the table and the coffee had been brought in,
and the men's cigars were lit, Austin said:

"What a magnificently beautiful creature she has grown into."

"Whom do you mean?" asked Dick.

"Why, Viviette, of course. She's the most fascinating thing I've come
across for years."