e point for you
to seize on is this--if you haven't noticed it already: that Beryl
has become an uncommonly good business woman. And what's more, my
dear, you've improved _her_ just as you improved _me_" (Honoria
deprecates this with a gesture, as she sits looking into the fire).
"Beryl's talk is getting ever so much less reckless. And she takes
jolly good care not to scandalize a client. She finds Adams--she
tells me--so severe at the least jest or personality that she only
talks to him now on business matters, and finds him a great
stand-by; and the other day she told Miss A.--as you call the senior
clerk--she ought to be ashamed of herself, bringing in a copy of the
_Vie Parisienne_. The way she settled Mrs. Gordon's affairs--you
remember, No. 3875 you catalogued the case--was masterly; and Mrs.
G. has insisted on paying 5 per cent. commission on the recovered
property. And it was Beryl who found out that leakage in the
'Variegated Tea Rooms' statement of accounts. I hadn't spotted it.
No. I think we needn't be anxious about Beryl, especially whilst I
am in Wales and you are giving yourself up--as you ought to do--to
your mother. But it's coming to _this_, Honoria--" (Enter waiter.
David says "Oh, damn," half audibly. Waiter is confirmed in his
suspicions, but as he likes Honoria immensely resolves to say
nothing about them in the Steward's room. She is such a kind young
lady. He explains he has come to take the tea things away, and
Honoria replies "Capital idea! Now, David, you'll be able to have
the whole table for your accounts!").... "It's coming to _this_,
Honoria," says David, clearing his throat, "that you will soon be
wanting not to be bothered any more with the affairs of _Fraser and
Warren_, and after I really get into the Law business I too shall
require to detach myself. Let us therefore be thankful that Beryl is
shaping so well. I rather think this summer you will have to get
more office accommodation and give her some more responsible women
to help her.... _Now_ finish what you were saying about Major
Armstrong."

_Honoria_: "Of _course_ I shall marry him some day. I suppose I felt
that the day after I first met him. But it amuses me to be under no
illusion. I am sure this is what happened two years ago--or whenever
it was he came back wounded from your favourite haunt, South Africa.
Michael Rossiter--who likes 'Army' enormously--I think they were at
school or college together--said to Linda, his wife