John is doing
nothing, which again is not a Scotch accomplishment, and he looks
rather miserable and dour. The Comtesse is already at her Patience
cards, and occasionally she smiles on him as if not displeased with
his long silence. At last she speaks:]
COMTESSE. I feel it rather a shame to detain you here on such a
lovely day, Mr. Shand, entertaining an old woman.
JOHN. I don't pretend to think I'm entertaining you, Comtesse.
COMTESSE. But you ARE, you know.
JOHN. I would be pleased to be told how?
[She shrugs her impertinent shoulders, and presently there is another
heavy sigh from JOHN.]
COMTESSE. Again! Why do not you go out on the river?
JOHN. Yes, I can do that. [He rises.]
COMTESSE. And take Sybil with you. [He sits again.] No?
JOHN. I have been on the river with her twenty times.
COMTESSE. Then take her for a long walk through the Fairloe woods.
JOHN. We were there twice last week.
COMTESSE. There is a romantically damp little arbour at the end of
what the villagers call the Lovers' Lane.
JOHN. One can't go there every day. I see nothing to laugh at.
COMTESSE. Did I laugh? I must have been translating the situation
into French.
[Perhaps the music of the lawn-mower is not to JOHN's mood, for he
betakes himself to another room. MR. VENABLES pauses in his labours
to greet a lady who has appeared on the lawn, and who is MAGGIE.
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