Natalie worked with him, spending much time and a prodigious amount of energy. There was springing up between them one of those curious and dangerous intimacies, of idleness on the woman's part, of admiration on the man's, which sometimes develop into a wholly spurious passion. Probably Rodney realized it; certainly Natalie did not. She liked his admiration; she dressed, each day, for Rodney's unfailing comment on her clothes.
“Clay never notices what I wear,” she said, once, plaintively.
So it was Rodney who brought Audrey Valentine out of her seclusion, and he did it by making her angry. He dropped in to see her between Christmas and New-years, and made a plea.
“A stable-warming!” she said. “How interesting! And fancy dress! Are you going to have them come as grooms, or jockeys? If I were going I'd go as a circus-rider. I used to be able to stand up on a running horse. Of course you're having horses. What's a stable without a horse?”
He saw she was laughing at him and was rather resentful.
“I told you I have made it into a studio.”
But when he implored her to go, she was obdurate.
“Do go away and let me alone, Rodney,” she said at last. “I loathe fancy-dress parties.”
“Then don't have it. I've told you, over and over, I'm not going out. It isn't decent this year, in my opinion. And, anyhow, I haven't any money, any clothes, any anything. A bad evening at bridge, and I shouldn't be able to pay my rent.”
“That's nonsense. Why do you let people say you are moping about Chris? You're not.”
“Well, there's some talk, naturally. You can't be as popular as you have been, and then just drop out, without some gossip. It's not bad.”
“Well, of course, you have been pretty strong on the war stuff?”
“If only you wouldn't hide, Audrey. That's what has made the talk. It's not Chris's going.”
“I'm not hiding. That's idiotic. I was bored to death, if you want the truth. Look here, Rodney. You're not being honest. What do they say about Chris and myself?”
“Well, of course now and then--there are always such stories. And of course Chris--”
“Yes, they knew Chris.” Her voice was scornful. “So they think I'm moping and hiding because--How interesting!”
She sat back, with her old insolent smile.
“Poor Chris!” she said. “The only man in the lot except Clay Spencer who is doing his bit for the war, and they--when is your party, Roddie?”