Well, he is my Son of Consolation," and Dinah heaved a gentle sigh, as though the motherhood within her, the divine maternal instinct inherent in all true women, felt itself satisfied.
At breakfast the next morning Malcolm proffered his services; but Elizabeth assured him that Cedric and Johnson would do all that was required, so he spent his morning indolently down by the Pool--reading and indulging in his favourite daydreams--until Cedric joined him.
Cedric looked heated and tired.
"I never saw such a person as Betty for getting work out of a fellow," he grumbled.

"She would do splendidly on a rice plantation--wouldn't the niggers fly just! Why, she set me rolling the tennis lawn, because she wanted Johnson; and then I had to bicycle over to Rotherwood for something that had been forgotten.

I took it out in cool drinks though, I can tell you.

My word, Bet does know how to make prime claret cup"-- and Cedric smacked his lips with the air of a veteran gourmand; and then he sparred at Malcolm, and called him an absent-minded beggar, and asked if he had finished his ode to the naiad of the Pool, and made sundry other aggravating remarks, which proved that he was in excellent spirits and only wanted to find a safety-valve.
Just before the first carriage drove up, Malcolm, who was standing by Elizabeth on the terrace, suggested that she and Mr.Carlyon should give him and Cedric their revenge; but she told him quite seriously that they must not think of it for the present.
"The sets are all arranged, and Dinah and I must devote ourselves to our guests," she remarked; and as this was only reasonable, Malcolm said no more.
"I am going to introduce you to Tina Ross," she continued.

"There she and her sister Patty are just coming up the drive now.