‘I think he has an ambition,’ said Miss Harris, into the dark.
‘Ah! Then we must continue,’ I said--‘continue to push from behind.’
Dora did not reply. She is a person of energy and determination, and might have been expected to offer to cooperate gladly. But she didn’t.
‘He is painting a large picture for next season’s exhibition,’ she informed me. ‘I was not allowed to see it or to know anything about it, but he declares it will bring Simla down.’
‘Oh, I hope so. I have told him,’ Dora continued, slowly, ‘that a great deal depends on it.’
‘Here is Mrs. Symons,’ I was able to return, ‘and I am afraid she is looking for you.’
March came, and the city lay white under its own dust. The electric fans began to purr in the Club, and Lent brought the flagging season to a full stop. I had to go that year on tour through the famine district with the Member, and we escaped, gasping, from the Plains about the middle of April. Simla was crimson with rhododendron blossoms, and seemed a spur of Arcady. There had been the usual number of flittings from one house to another, and among them I heard with satisfaction that Armour no longer occupied Amy Villa. I would not for the world have blurred my recollections of that last evening--I could not have gone there again.
‘He is staying with Sir William Lamb,’ said Dora, handing me my cup of tea. ‘And I am quite jealous. Sir William, only Sir William, has been allowed to see the exhibition picture.’
‘What does that portend?’ I said, thoughtfully.
‘I don’t know. Sir William was here yesterday simply swelling with his impression of it. He says it’s the finest thing that has been done in India. I told you he would conquer them.’
‘You did,’ and without thinking I added, ‘I hope you won’t be sorry that you asked him to.’ It must have been an inspiration.
Armour, those weeks before the exhibition, seemed invisible. Dora reported him torn with the incapacity of the bazaar frame-maker to follow a design, and otherwise excessively occupied, and there was no lack of demands upon my own time. Besides, my ardour to be of assistance to the young man found a slight damper in the fact that he was staying with Sir William Lamb. What competence had I to be of use to the guest of Sir William Lamb?