After the meal she went with him round the garden, inspected
both roses and puppy, and manifested great interest in a trellis he was
constructing for the accommodation later in the summer of some climbing
cucumbers, at present only visible as modest leaves in flower-pots.
Neither made any reference to the little scene of the night before.
Morning had brought to Dick the conviction that in refusing her hand and
slamming the door he had behaved in an unpardonably bearish manner; and
he could not apologise for his behaviour unless he confessed his
jealousy of Austin, which, in all probability, would have subjected him
to the mocking ridicule of Viviette--a thing which, above all others, he
dreaded, and against which he knew himself to be defenceless. Viviette,
too, found silence golden. She knew perfectly well why Dick had slammed
the door. An explanation would have been absurd. It would have
interfered with her relations with Austin, which were beginning to be
exciting. But she loved Dick in her heart for being a bear, and evinced
both her compunction and her appreciation in peculiar graciousness.
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