The reception of this letter proved an agreeable incident of an otherwise rather dull Sunday evening at Nab Grange. The Marchesa had been bored; the Colonel was sulky. Miss Gilletson had forbidden cards; her conscience would not allow herself, nor her feelings of envy permit other people, to play on the Sabbath. Lady Norah and Violet Dufaure were somewhat at cross-purposes, each preferring to talk to Stillford and endeavoring, under a false show of amity, to foist Captain Irons on to the other.
"Listen to this!" cried the Marchesa vivaciously. She read it out. "He doesn't beat about the bush, does he? I'm to surrender before eight o'clock to-morrow morning!"
"Sounds rather a peremptory sort of a chap!" observed Colonel Wenman.
"I," remarked Lady Norah, "shouldn't so much as answer him, Helena."
"I shall certainly answer him and tell him that he'll trespass on my property at his peril," said the Marchesa haughtily. "Isn't that the right way to put it, Mr. Stillford?"
"If it would be a trespass, that might be one way to put it," was Stillford's professionally cautious advice. "But as I ventured to tell you when you determined to put on the padlock, the rights in the matter are not quite as clear as we could wish."
"When I bought this place, I bought a private estate—a private estate, Mr. Stillford—for myself—not a short cut for Lord Lynborough! Am I to put up a notice for him, 'This Way to the Bathing-Machines'?"
"I wouldn't stand it for a moment." Captain Irons sounded bellicose.
Violet Dufaure was amicably inclined.
"You might give him leave to walk through. It would be a bore for him to go round by the road every time."