She understood it perfectly and it made her inclined to laugh.
"I shan't be able to eat any dinner," he said, "and if I know Dorothy the dinner's damned good".
"Why not?"
"I ought to have been told.
Some one really ought to have warned me."
"What about?"
"No one said a word.
How was I to know that I was going to meet a raging beauty?"
"Now what am I to say to that?"
"Nothing.
Leave me to do the talking.
And I'll say it over and over again."
Kitty, unmoved, wondered what exactly his wife had told him about her.
He must have asked.
And Townsend, looking down on her with his laughing eyes, suddenly remembered.
"What is she like?" he had inquired when his wife told him she had met Dr. Fane's bride.
"Oh, quite a nice little thing.
Actressy."
"Was she on the stage?"
"Oh, no, I don't think so.
Her father's a doctor or a lawyer or something.
I suppose we shall have to ask them to dinner."
"There's no hurry, is there?"
When they were sitting side by side at table he told her that he had known Walter Fane ever since he came to the Colony.
"We play bridge together.
He's far and away the best bridge player at the Club."
She told Walter on the way home.
"That's not saying very much, you know."
"How does he play?"
"Not badly.
He plays a winning hand very well, but when he has bad cards he goes all to pieces."
"Does he play as well as you?"
"I have no illusions about my play.
I should describe myself as a very good player in the second class.
Townsend thinks he's in the first.
He isn't."
"Don't you like him?"
"I neither like him nor dislike him.
I believe he's not bad at his job and everyone says he's a good sportsman.
He doesn't very much interest me."
It was not the first time that Walter's moderation had exasperated her.
She asked herself why it was necessary to be so prudent: you either liked people or you didn't.
She had liked Charles Townsend very much.
And she had not expected to.
He was probably the most popular man in the Colony.
It was supposed that the Colonial Secretary would retire soon and everyone hoped that Townsend would succeed him.
He played tennis and polo and golf.
He kept racing ponies.
He was always ready to do any one a good turn.
He never let red tape* interfere with him.