Free Devil's Wind by Patricia Wentworth

should be jealous, though of course Dick isn’t like that. He really doesn’t even look at another woman. Sometimes I wish he would.”
    â€œAdie! How silly you are.”
    â€œWell, it’s because he watches me. It’s too horrid. You remember what poor mamma used to say about the way he looked at me? Well, it’s quite true, and if he would only look at some one else for a change, it would give me a rest. Of course, I don’t mean anything serious. Just a flirtation, but Richard doesn’t flirt.”
    â€œAnd you are not going to either. Adie, you have been a goose, but now you are going to be good, aren’t you?”
    â€œOh, I suppose so,” said Adela, and she went away, humming a tune.
    Helen sat down and cried. In the two years since she and Adela parted, Helen had learned many things.
    Now the dreams were all gone.

CHAPTER VI
    HOW MRS. CROWTHER GAVE A DINNER-PARTY
    Yesterday’s fire is clean gone out,
    Yesterday’s hearth is cold.
    No one can either bargain or buy
    With last year’s gold.
    Greet the new as it passes on,
    Bid Good-bye to the old,
    Yesterday’s Song is sung to the end,
    Yesterday’s Tale is told.
    The Mortons had been in Urzeepore for a fortnight when Mrs. Crowther gave a dinner-party, to which they and all official Urzeepore were bidden. It was a warm March night, and the dinner was rather a tremendous affair, Mrs. Crowther desiring to make it quite plain that, Deputy Commissioner or no Deputy Commissioner, she herself was the leading lady of Urzeepore society, and intended to remain so. She wore a fateful air, and a garment which was believed to have been her wedding-dress. It was now dyed grass green, and was adorned with seven little flounces of green tulle, edged with yellow tinsel trimming. Above all the expanse of green, Mrs. Crowther’s brick-red countenance looked several shades redder than usual. Her masses of brilliantly golden hair hung low on a sunburned neck. Her features were as harsh as the voice in which she was addressing much rapid conversation to faded, white-faced Mrs. Marsh, who sat on the sofa beside her.
    On either side of the couch stood Carrie and Milly Crowther, and when their mother wished to make a remark unsuited to their youthful ears, she dropped into what she believed to be the French language. It had a most respectably British ring. It was many years since she had acquired this habit, and it had become second nature.
    She rose in the middle of a sentence to shake hands with Mrs. Monson and Mrs. Elliot. The latter put her head on one side and said languidly:
    â€œWe are to meet the Mortons, are we not? I hear she is quite lovely, and dresses so well. Have you seen her yet?”
    â€œNo,” said Mrs. Crowther. She dropped Mrs. Elliot’s hand and sat down again.
    â€œNo,” she repeated, “I have not seen her; I don’t believe any one has seen her. I called. She has singularly ill-trained servants. The man I saw had been asleep. He actually yawned in my face. Insolence incroydble! And he said—he said—” Mrs. Crowther glanced to right and left, searched in her memory for a recalcitrant French word and decided upon her native tongue—“he said the Memsahib is in her bath. Dong song bang!” she repeated in tones of returning confidence.
    Mrs. Elliot fixed her with an admiring gaze. “One always bows to courage,” she murmured in Mrs. Monson’s ear, to which that little lady responded with a severe “Do be good, Grace.”
    â€œOne never does know what they say,” complained Mrs. Marsh. She was fidgeting with the lace at her elbows, and had conceived a panic lest the hole she had discovered should be visible to Mrs. Crowther’s searching eye.
    â€œI wonder if Mrs. Morton is as pretty as they say,” she said hastily.
    Mrs. Crowther sniffed aloud.
    â€œI never liked Captain Morton,” she said in virtuous tones. “I never