She laughed.
"No, I mean the prisoners; I was listening to their voices. Just now
they were throwing snowballs."
Endymion dropped the tongs with a clatter; picked them up, set them in
place, and faced the room again with a flush which might have come
from stooping over the fire.
"Come to breakfast, dear," said Dorothea, busy with the tea-urn. "I
have a small plan I want your permission for, and your help. It is
about the prisoners. General Rochambeau and M. Raoul--"
"Are doubtless prepared to teach me my business," snapped Endymion,
who seemed in bad humour this morning.
"No--but listen, dear! They praise you warmly. For whom but my brother
would these poor men have worked as they did upon the Orange Room--
and all to show their gratitude? But it appears the worst part of
captivity is its tedium and the way it depresses the mind; one sees
that it must be. They dread Sundays most of all. And I said I would
speak to you, and if any way could be found--"
"My dear Dorothea," Endymion slipped his hands beneath his coat-tails
and stood astraddle, "I have not often to request you, to mind your
own affairs; but really when it comes to making a promise in my name--"
"Not a promise."
"May I ask you if you seriously propose to familiarise Axcester with
all the orgies of a Continental Sabbath? Already the prisoners spend
Sunday in playing chess, draughts, cards, dominoes; practices which I
connive at, only insisting that they are kept out of sight, but from
which I endeavour to wean them--those at least who have a taste for
music--by encouraging them to, take part in our Church services.
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