CHAPTER XI
"I don't quite see ourselves bluffing all and sundry that you are Lord Quorn," Peckover said doubtfully, as they finished the bottle.
"My good sir," replied Gage, "I don't see how we can help taking them in if we make up our minds to do it. Just think; what man is there alive who could really, logically prove his own identity if he were put to it. Not one of us. We are just accepted by the world as William White and Henry Black, John Thompson or Thomas Johnson; and in most cases correctly so. In one case in ten thousand the world makes a big mistake, but it doesn't count for much."
"Suppose not," observed Peckover, wondering whether he would not have plenty of enforced leisure for counting if the world should find out its mistake about him.
"Very few people know us over here," argued Gage; "and the few who do can be easily bluffed, if it comes to that. If we both swear to the same thing, who can stand against us?"
"No, that's right enough," Peckover agreed.
"Now I've been thinking," continued Gage, "that it won't do for us to part company till this little arrangement of ours can run along without pushing. You must come over to these Towers with me and see how the land lies. We shall want to spend some money, at least I shall, so you had better be a rich friend I picked up on the voyage, and we can pretend the ready comes out of your pocket."
"But only Lord Quorn is asked," Peckover objected.
"Oh," replied Gage, "a rich man is always sure of a welcome. He may be expected to pay for it, but there it is, all ready for him, if he asks for it cheque-book in hand."
"I see."
"Perhaps it may not be a very genuine article; a sort of rolled-gold welcome for which you are expected to pay as though it were twenty-two carat all through. But it will wear long enough for our purposes, and the adulteration won't be all on their side."
Host Popkiss looked in. "Rain clearing off, my lord," he announced. "I expect Colonel Hemyock will be here directly to welcome your lordship."
"All right, landlord," replied Gage. "In the meantime my friend and I are quite comfortable here."
Popkiss stared at him, in mind to resent what he considered an irreverent liberty.
"Still, I shan't be sorry to find myself at the Towers," Gage observed casually.
This was rather more than Popkiss could stand. He did not approve of casual customers (even if they ordered champagne) playing unseemly jokes with noble guests in his coffee-room. "Beg pardon, sir," he said with puffing severity, "I was addressing myself to Lord Quorn."
"Then," returned Gage, "you were addressing yourself to me."
In consequence of the superincumbent fat which circumvallated them Mr. Popkiss could not open his eyes very wide, but, as far as the muffling flesh permitted, his spacious face was understood to express an electrifying astonishment amounting almost to incredulity. "Lord Quorn? You, sir?" he gasped.
"Look here, my venerable joker." Peckover beckoned the bewildered Popkiss to him by a backward jerk of the head. "You've been tying yourself up in the wrong bag all the afternoon. I've let you go on because I never spoil a good joke, but now my friend and fellow-traveller, Lord Quorn, has appeared, it is about time your folly was pointed out to you."
"I'm sure I'm very sorry, my lord," the discomfited Popkiss apologized. "But as this gentleman did not deny it when I addressed him as my lord, and as we were expecting your lordship to honour my poor house, why, the mistake was only natural."
"That's all right," replied Gage.
"You're forgiven," grinned Peckover.
Wheels sounded under the archway of the courtyard, and Popkiss was glad to bustle out. "I had my doubts about him all the time," he told himself in extenuation of his error. "If I'd seen them both together at first I should ha' known at once that 'tother was the lord."
Meanwhile the two confederates were laughing at each other over the success of the first step on the path that promised to be so pleasant for both.
They composed their faces as the door was thrown open and Colonel Hemyock and the Misses Ethel and Dagmar Hemyock, accompanied by John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook, were ushered in with breathless ceremony by the egregious Popkiss.
"Lord Quorn?" the Colonel inquired in a tone of pompous cordiality.
Popkiss unctuously indicated Gage, who came forward with plausible aplomb.
Then the ladies were presented, and Sharnbrook noticed gleefully the dead-set that lurked in their eyes. His escape, he told himself, was now assured.
"May I present my friend, Mr. Percival Gage?" the supposititious Lord Quorn said, as, taking the permission for granted, he brought up Peckover, whom, however, the Hemyock trio regarded a trifle doubtfully. "Made a fine position for himself out in our part of the world," Gage continued half confidentially, "and has come over to the old country to enjoy the fruits of his good fortune."
The ladies instantly thawed. The golden sun easily gets through snobbery's thin coating of ice. They looked at his aggressive diamond, excused his vulgar flashiness on the ground of Colonial ignorance, and received his advances with as much gush as was left over from the lavish expenditure on the soi-disant Lord Quorn.
"A millionaire," Gage observed to the colonel, sinking his confidential tone yet a little. The highly starched Colonel became almost limp under such a shower of good fortune.
"I—ah—hope Mr. Gage will do us the honour of staying at Staplewick," he said, and there was no doubt that he meant it. "Lady Agatha will be charmed. Any friend of Lord Quorn's will be more than welcome."
So after a few more flourishes, it was settled. Mr. Gage's luggage had unfortunately gone astray, but his costume would be excused that evening by Lady Agatha, and next day a complete outfit, the visitor declared, would be a mere question of the resources of Great Bunbury.
Presently the neglected but chuckling John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook was noticed, and casually, as a matter of grace, introduced. He lost no time in getting on easy terms with his prospective deliverer.
"I'm the tenant of your shooting, Lord Quorn."
"Hope you get good sport?" Gage replied politely.
"Birds thick as cabbages," Sharnbrook assured him. "I hope you will come out with me and see for yourself. Of course you and your friend shoot?"
"I should just think we did," Peckover chipped in with an eagerness due to the near realization of one of the dreams of his life. Hitherto his shooting had taken place under cover at the rate of seven shoots for six-pence, and the presentation of a cocoa-nut if by luck or markmanship he rang the bell.
That so bucolic and provoking a person as Sharnbrook at present clothed in the contempt woven of familiarity should be allowed to monopolize the distinguished guests by his stupid sporting chatter was intolerable. Accordingly he was promptly snubbed and thrust aside. Then, amid much smirking and exhibition of the best side of everybody's face, a move was made for the phaeton. Gage surreptitiously slipped a bank note into Peckover's hand, with which, and with a grand flourish, that unexpected plutocrat settled the somewhat exorbitant demands of Mr. Popkiss, and bestowed a liberal guerdon, accompanied by a wink, on Miss Mercy. Then with what excitement and the nearest approach to cheers a country town on a wet evening can furnish the distinguished party drove off to Staplewick Towers.