Mrs. Ames by E. F. Benson Page A

heard from the other end of the table.
    â€˜Then shall we have our coffee outside?’ she said. ‘Harry, if you will ring the bell - ’
    There was the pushing back of chairs, and Mrs Altham passed along the table to the French windows that opened on to the verandah.
    â€˜I hear Major Ames has been picking the loveliest sweet peas all the morning,’ she said to her hostess. ‘It would be such a pleasure to see them. I always admire Major Ames’ sweet peas.’
    Now this was unfortunate, for Mrs Altham desired information herself, but by her speech she had only succeeded in giving information to Mrs Ames, who guessed without the slightest difficulty where the sweet peas had gone, which she had not yet known had been picked. She was alreadyconsiderably annoyed with her husband for his unceremonious desertion of her luncheon party, and was aware that Mrs Altham would cause the fact to be as well known in Riseborough as if it had been inserted in the column of local intelligence in the county paper. But she felt she would sooner put it there herself than let Mrs Altham know where he and his sweet peas were. She had no greater objection (or if she had, she studiously concealed it from herself even) to his going to lunch in this improvising manner with Mrs Evans than if he had gone to lunch with anybody else; what she minded was his non-appearance at an institution so firmly established and so faithfully observed as the lunch that followed the dinner party. But at the moment her entire mind was set on thwarting Mrs Altham. She looked interested.
    â€˜Indeed, has he been picking sweet peas?’ she said. ‘I must scold him if it was only that which kept him away from church. I don’t know what he has done with them. Very likely they are in his dressing room: he often likes to have flowers there. But as you admire his sweet peas so much, pray walk down the garden, and look at them. You will find them in their full beauty.’
    This, of course, was not in the least what Mrs Altham wanted, since she did not care two straws for the rest of the sweet peas. But life was scarcely worth living unless she knew where those particular sweet peas were. As for their being in his dressing room, she felt that Mrs Ames must have a very poor opinion of her intellectual capacities, if she thought that an old wives’ tale like that would satisfy it. In this she was partly right: Mrs Ames had indeed no opinion at all of her mind; on the other hand, she did not for a moment suppose that this suggestion about the dressing room would content that feeble organ. It was not designed to: the objectwas to stir it to a wilder and still unsatisfied curiosity. It perfectly succeeded, and from by-ways Mrs Altham emerged full speed, like a motorcar, into the high road of direct question.
    â€˜I am sure they are lovely,’ she said. ‘And where is Major Ames lunching?’
    Mrs Ames raised the pieces of her face where there might have been eyebrows in other days. She told one of the truths that Bismarck loved.
    â€˜He did not tell me before he went out,’ she said. ‘Perhaps Harry knows. Harry, where is your father lunching?’
    Now this was ludicrous. As if it was possible that any wife in Riseborough did not know where her husband was lunching! Harry apparently did not know either, and Mrs Ames, tasting the joys of the bull-baiter, goaded Mrs Altham further by pointedly asking Parker, when she brought the coffee, if she knew where the Major was lunching. Of course Parker did not, and so Parker was told to cut Mrs Altham a nice bunch of sweet peas to carry away with her.
    This pleasant duty of thwarting undue curiosity being performed, Mrs Ames turned to Mr Pettit, though she had not quite done with Mrs Altham yet. For she had heard on the best authority that Mrs Altham occasionally indulged in the disgusting and unfeminine habit of cigarette smoking. Mrs Brooks had several times seen her walking