“And you’d be right, sir,” said Chives with an appreciative chuckle. “Old Chives would put him down too, sir. Good and proper. Now, I want you ladies to have a good look at those old peas. You won’t find finer, not in the Duke’s vegetable garden. What you want, ladies, is to have a good look at them.”
Mrs. Arbuthnot said in a rebellious undertone that she didn’t. Mrs. Brandon put her large horn spectacles on, looked vaguely in the direction of the peas, and expressed an admiration which almost satisfied the vegetable-loving Chives, who as a reward gave her a dissertation on the use and abuse of chicken-dung well matured and dug in. So that when Colin, who had mislaid his hostesses, at last discovered their whereabouts, no one took any notice of him and he was able to torture himself by im
