"Chesterford," returned the other.
Jack made a neat little hole with the ferrule of his stick in the
gravel in front of him, and performed a small burial service for the
end of his cigarette. The action was slightly allegorical.
"He's my first cousin," he said. "However, I may be excused for
not feeling distinctly sympathetic with my first cousin. Must I
congratulate him?"
"That's as you like," said the other. "I really don't see why you
shouldn't. But it is rather overwhelming, isn't it? You know Dodo is
awfully charming, but she hasn't got any of the domestic virtues.
Besides, she ought to be an empress," he added loyally.
"I suppose a marchioness is something," said Jack. "But I didn't expect
it one little bit. Of course he is hopelessly in love. And so Dodo has
decided to make him happy."
"It seems so," said Bertie, with a fine determination not to draw
inferences.
"Ah, but don't you see----" said Jack.
"Oh, it's all right," said Bertie. "He is devoted to her, and she is
clever and stimulating. Personally I shouldn't like a stimulating wife.
I don't like stimulating people, I don't think they wear well. It would
be like sipping brandy all day. Fancy having brandy at five o'clock
tea. What a prospect, you know! Dodo's too smart for my taste."
"She never bores one," said Jack.
"No, but she makes me feel as if I was sitting under a flaming
gas-burner, which was beating on to what Nature designed to be my
brain-cover."
"Nonsense," said Jack. "You don't know her. There she is. Ah!"
A dog-cart had stopped close by them, and a girl got out, leaving a
particularly diminutive groom at the pony's head. If anything she was a
shade more perfectly dressed than the rest of the crowd, and she seemed
to know it. Behind her walked another girl, who was obviously intended
to walk behind, while Dodo was equally obviously made to walk in front.