"Do you know, I have heard since that to give any one a knife cuts friendship, and brings bad luck and separation, and numbers of dreadful things. So you and I are now declared enemies, I suppose. Shall we go and throw the little ill-omen in the lake after lunch?" "No; I will not part with my knife; I find it very useful," I said, in a _bête_ way. "Antony," called out Lord Tilchester, "you have arrived in the nick of time to save Babykins from turning into a hospital nurse. She thinks the costume becoming, and threatens to leave us for the wounded heroes. Cannot you restrain her?" "How?" asked Sir Antony, helping himself to some chicken curry. "Really excellent curry your chef makes, Tilchester." "Don't tell him about it, Reggie," lisped Mrs. Parton-Mills. "The unfeeling creature is only thinking of his food." "You seem to have all the qualities for an ideal convalescent nurse," said Sir Antony, with an air of detaching himself with difficulty from the contemplation of the curry. "And those qualities are--?" asked Lord Tilchester. "Principally stimulating," and he selected a special chutney from the various kinds a footman was handing. "What do you mean?" demanded Babykins, pouting. "Exactly what you do," and he looked at her, smiling in a way I should have said was insolent had it been I who was concerned. "But I want to go and help the poor dear fellows, and to cheer them and make their time pleasanter." "I said you would be an ideal convalescent nurse. But what would become of the pigs?" "Oh, Edward could look after them. I think too little attention has been paid to the poor boys who are getting well. I could read to them and write their letters home for them," and she looked pathetically sympathetic. "Hubble-bubble, toil and trouble," quoted Sir Antony. "Who for?" laughed Lord Tilchester, in his rough, gruff way. "The recipients of the letters, who would certainly receive them in the wrong envelopes," said Sir Antony. "I think, Tilchester, you had better persuade Babykins to stay in England, for the sake of the peace of many respectable and innocent families." "How wicked you are to me," flashed Babykins. "Just what you deserve," chuckled Lord Tilchester. "What tiresome nonsense these people talk," said Sir Antony, calmly, to me. "You and I were in the middle of an interesting problem discussion, were we not? And now I have lost the thread." "It does not in the least matter," I said. The Duke, who was on the other side of me, did not care to be left out, and persistently talked to me for the rest of lunch. Sir Antony consumed his with the appreciation of a connoisseur. It appeared to be the only thing which interested him. Babykins, from the other side, did her utmost to engage him in a war of wits, but he remained calm, with the air of a placid lion. When we got outside in the great tent he came up to me. "I am going to take you for a walk," he said--"a nice, cool walk in the woods. Will you get your parasol?"