Roger turned to Stratton. 'That's a particularly nice man, isn't it?'
'Yes,' Stratton agreed. 'His family and mine, and his wife's family, were all more or less brought up together; so the Chalmers are really about my oldest friends. Philip's elder brother was my contemporary, and Philip is really a closer friend of my brother's than mine, but I like him immensely. He's absolutely genuine, nearly always says just what he thinks, and is the only man I've ever met called Philip who isn't a prig. And more I can't say for any man.'
'Hear, hear,' Roger agreed. 'Hullo, is that the music? I suppose I'd better go and do a bit of duty. Introduce me to somebody I'd like to dance with, will you?'
'I'll introduce you to my young woman,' Stratton said, finishing off his drink.
'Odd,' Roger remarked idly. 'I always used to think you were married.'
'I always used to be. Then we had a divorce. Now I'm going to do it again. You must meet my ex - wife some time. She's quite a nice person. She's here tonight, with her fiance. We're the best friends in the world.'
'Very sensible,' Roger approved. 'If I ever got married so that I could be divorced, I'm sure I should be so grateful to my wife that I'd want to be the best friends in the world with her.'
They walked together towards the ballroom. Roger noticed with interest that Mrs. Pearcey was just in front of them, with an unknown man. Evidently she had torn herself away from Dr. Crippen.
'I say, Ronald!' A low, guarded voice had assailed them from behind. Turning about, they beheld Dr. Crippen, clinging, as it were desperately, to a large whiskey - and - soda. No one else remained at the bar.
'Hullo, Osbert,' said Stratton.
'I say . . .' Dr. Crippen sidled towards them with a surreptitious air, as one not quite sure whether he is standing on solid ground again or not. 'I say ...'
'Yes?'
'I say,' said Dr. Crippen, with a confidential, guilty grin, 'is your sister - in - law quite mad, Ronald? Eh? Is she?'
'Quite,' said Stratton equably. 'Come on, Sheringham.'
Ronald Stratton's young woman proved to be a charming lady of about his own age, with very fair hair and a delightful smile, who admitted to two children of her own and the name of Mrs. Lefroy. She wore a seventeenth - century dress of white satin brocade, with a hooped skirt, which admirably set off her fair colouring.
'You've been married before, then?' Roger asked conversationally, as they began to dance.
'I still am,' replied Mrs. Lefroy surprisingly. 'At least, I think I am.'
Roger made an apologetic noise. 'I somehow thought you were engaged to Ronald,' he said lamely.
'Oh, yes, I am,' said Mrs. Lefroy brightly.
Roger gave it up.
'I've got my nisi' Mrs. Lefroy explained, 'but not my absolute.'
'This seems to be quite a modern party,' Roger observed mildly, swerving somewhat violently to avoid another couple who did not seem to know what they were doing. As they passed, he saw that the couple was composed, as to its feminine half, of Mrs. Pearcey, who was talking so earnestly to her partner that he was able to devote little attention to the steering of her.
'Modern?' echoed Mrs. Lefroy. 'Is it? Only as regards the Strattons and me, I think - if by 'modern' you mean not only readiness to recognize that you've made a mistake in your marriage, which is what most married couples always have done, but readiness to rectify it, which is what most of them still haven't the courage to do.'
'And yet you're ready to try again?'
'Oh, yes. One mistake doesn't make a series. Besides, I never think a first marriage ought to count, do you? One's so busy learning how to be married at all that one can hardly help acquiring a kind of resentment against one's partner in error, And once resentment has crept in, the thing's finished. Anyhow, there one is, all nice and trained to the house, the complete article for the next comer. After all, one's got to cut one's teeth on something, but one doesn't cherish the dummy for the rest of one's life, does one?'
She laughed, and Roger laughed too. 'But nature provides a second set of teeth. Haven't they to be cut on another dummy?'
'Oh, no, they just come, all ready cut. But I'm quite serious, Mr. Sheringham. One isn't the same person at thirty - four as one was at twenty - four, so why should one be expected to be suitable to the human being who fitted ten years earlier? Probably both of you have developed, on completely different lines. I think one should change partners when one's development is complete, except of course in the rare cases where the two do happen to have developed together.'
'You needn't apologize for your divorce, you know,' Roger murmured.
Mrs. Lefroy laughed again. 'I wouldn't dream of doing any such thing. It just happens to be a subject I feel rather strongly about. What I think is that our marriage laws are all on the wrong lines. Marriage oughtn't to be easy and divorce difficult; it ought to be just the other way about. A couple ought to have to go up before a judge and say: 'Please, we've lived together for two years now and we're quite certain we're suited to each other. We've got our witnesses here to swear that ] we're terribly fond of each other and hardly ever quarrel, and we like the same things; and we're both quite healthy. We're certain we know our own minds, so please, can't we get married now?' And then they'd get their marriage nisi. And if by the end of six months the King's Proctor couldn't prove that they were unsuited after all, or didn't really love each other, or would be better apart, their marriage could be made absolute. Don't you think that's a very good idea?'
'It's the best idea I've ever heard about marriage yet,' said Roger with conviction, 'and I've produced a few myself.'
'Oh, yes, I know. Your idea is that the best thing to do is not to get married at all. Well, there's something to be said for that. At least, I'm sure my poor brother - in - law - to - be would agree with you.'
'Ronald's brother, you mean?'
'Yes. You know him, I suppose? That tall, good - looking fair young man over there, dancing with the woman in the leg - of - mutton sleeves - Mrs. Maybrick.'
'No, I don't know him. Why would he agree with me?'
'Oh!' Mrs. Lefroy looked a little guilty. 'Perhaps I oughtn't to have said anything. After all, I only know what Ronald's told me.'
'Is it a secret?' Roger pleaded, with unabashed curiosity.
'Well, I suppose so, in a way. Anyhow, I don't think I'd better say anything. But I shouldn't think,' added Mrs. Lefroy with a smile, 'that it will be a secret for long. You've only got to watch her.'
'I'll watch her,' said Roger. 'In the meantime, do you mind telling me who you're supposed to be?'
'Haven't you guessed? I thought you were a criminologist.' Mrs. Lefroy looked down not without pride at her billowing white skirts.
'So I am, not a costumier.'
'Well, the Marquise de Brinvilliers, then. Didn't you recognize the arsenic green of my necklace? I thought that was rather a subtle touch.' She picked up her bag and white velvet gloves from the top of the grand piano and glanced round the room.
'I can see that Ronald's infecting you,' Roger regretted.
He was sorry when Ronald came up, as if in response to the glance, and claimed his young woman. Mrs. Lefroy seemed to him a woman of ideas, and women of ideas are rare. So, for that matter, are men.
Roger drifted, as a man will, to the bar. His feeling that the party was going to be an interesting one was confirmed. It pleased him that ex - Mrs. Stratton should be present as well as future Mrs. Stratton, both of them all smiles and friendliness and completely unembarrassed. That is how things should be done in an enlightened age.
At the bar were Dr. Chalmers and another local doctor, who had once played rugger for England and was broad in proportion; he wore a red - and - white bandana handkerchief round his neck and a black mask pushed up on his forehead, and his hands were splashed with red. The two were discussing, in the way of doctors, some obscene innard belonging to one of their less fortunate patients, which Dr. Mitchell had been engaged that afternoon in yanking out. Beside them stood, angrily, a thin, dark lady. Roger recognized her as the Mrs. Maybrick with the leg - of - mutton sleeves who had been dancing with David Stratton.
'Ah, Sheringham,' Dr. Chalmers greeted him. 'We're talking shop, I'm afraid.'
'Do you ever talk anything else?' observed the thin, dark lady acidly.
