He knew all about the Hohenzollern, and indeed would boast to his few intimates—and he was fond of boasting—that Madame was an old friend of his, and that he had paid his first visit to the Third Floor when still at Harrow.
Beachbourne indeed suited him very well. It possessed a first-rate crammer; if he wanted Society there was the Club at the West-end, full always of Service men retired or on leave; and he could get as much golf and cricket as he liked.
A terrific worker, he would have no distractions: for he knew very few people socially. There would be no country-house invitations for him; nor did he court them. When he had passed through the Staff College and settled down in London for a spell at the War Office he knew very well that doors, now shut to him, would open. There was no hurry about that. He didn't mean to marry yet: he meant to enjoy himself.
In a word, Captain Royal was an adventurer of a kind by no means uncommon in our day. A Tory in his opinions and his prejudices he lacked the one thing that can make a Tory admirable, and that is Tradition.
When Colonel Lewknor once defined him as "A first-rate officer and a first-class cad," Conky Joe, the kindest of men but a first-rate hater, who had never quite got over the bias imbibed in the atmosphere of the "greatest of all schools," replied with scorn, rare scorn,
"Well, what d'you expect of Harrow?"
CHAPTER XXXVI
THE CAPTAIN BEGINS HIS SIEGE
The morning after Captain Royal's advent, Ernie, going his round of the Third Floor, dropping boots at various doors, stopped outside No. 72.
The door was open; and Ruth stood at the window looking sea-wards.