One day when I was sitting
by myself on The Slopes waiting for Jone, about lunch time, and with a
reminiscence floating through my mind of the Devonshire clotted cream
of the past, never perhaps to return, I saw an elderly woman coming
along, and when she got near she stopped and spoke. I knew her in an
instant. She was the old body we met at the Babylon Hotel, who told us
about the cottage at Chedcombe. I asked her to sit down beside me and
talk, because I wanted to tell her what good times we had had, and how
we liked the place, but she said she couldn't, as she was obliged to go
on.
"And did you like Chedcombe?" said she. "I hope you and your husband
kept well."
I said yes, except Jone's rheumatism, we felt splendid; for my aches
hadn't come on then, and I was going on to gush about the lovely
country she had sent us to, but she didn't seem to want to listen.
"Really," said she, "and your husband had the rheumatism. It was a
wise thing for you to come here. We English people have reason to be
proud of our country. If we have our banes, we also have our antidotes;
and it isn't every country that can say that, is it?"
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