There was old Saffron, for instance. He was, in
Irechester's private opinion, or, perhaps it should be said in his
private suspicions, an interesting case; yet, just for that reason,
unreliable, and evidently ready to take offense. It was because of cases
of that kind that he contemplated offering partnership to Mary; he would
both be sure of keeping them and able to devote himself to them.
But his wife laughed at Mary, or at that development of the feminist
movement which had produced her and so many other more startling
phenomena. The Doctor was fond of his wife, a sprightly, would-be
fashionable, still very pretty woman. But her laughter, and the opinion
it represented, were to him the merest crackling of thorns under a pot.
The fine afternoon had come, a few days before Christmas, and he sat,
side by side with Mr. Naylor, both warmly wrapped in coats and rugs,
watching the lawn tennis at Old Place. Doctor Mary and Beaumaroy were
playing together, the latter accustoming himself to a finger short in
gripping his racquet, against Cynthia and Captain Alec.
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