Men do take the most extraordinary fancies."
Matters never came exactly to a crisis. Mrs. Pentherby, as a source of
personal offence, spread herself over so wide an area that no one woman
of the party felt impelled to rise up and declare that she absolutely
refused to stay another week in the same house with her. What is
everybody's tragedy is nobody's tragedy. There was ever a certain
consolation in comparing notes as to specific acts of offence. Reggie's
sister-in-law had the added interest of trying to discover the secret
bond which blunted his condemnation of Mrs. Pentherby's long catalogue of
misdeeds. There was little to go on from his manner towards her in
public, but he remained obstinately unimpressed by anything that was said
against her in private.
With the one exception of Mrs. Pentherby's unpopularity, the house-party
scheme was a success on its first trial, and there was no difficulty
about reconstructing it on the same lines for another winter session. It
so happened that most of the women of the party, and two or three of the
men, would not be available on this occasion, but Reggie had laid his
plans well ahead and booked plenty of "fresh blood" for the departure.
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