“I have something supremely interesting here.” “Meanwhile, the teapot is taking liberties. Inside the cup, my dear Gertrude!” He had often seen her try to read a letter and fill a cup at the same moment. Sometimes she emptied the contents of the milk jug into the teapot, mistaking it for the hot water. “Dear, dear!” “It is rather difficult to concentrate on two things at once.” She passed him the cup standing in a sloppy saucer. “I take sugar!” “Do help yourself, James. I never can remember.” Gertrude finished glancing through the hospital report, and picked up a second letter. “I wanted to tell you that I have engaged Miss Carfax to paint the pictures for my book.” “What book, James?” “The book on English gardens.” “Oh, yes.” He saw her preparing to get lost in a long letter. “Miss Carfax has quite extraordinary ability. I think I may find her useful in other ways. Each year we have more people coming to us, wanting us to plan their gardens. She could take some of that work and save me time.” “That will be very nice for you, James.” “I need a second brain here, a brain that has an instinct for colour and effect.” “Yes, I think you do.” He sat and gazed at her with grave and half cynical amusement. Such a piece of news might have seemed of some importance to the average married woman, touching as it did, the edge of her own empire, and Canterton, as he watched her wrinkling up her forehead over those sheets of paper, realised how utterly unessential he had become to this woman whom he had married. He was not visible on her horizon. She included him among the familiar fixtures of Fernhill, and was not sufficiently interested even to suspect that any other woman might come into his life.