Mr Dawson rose, glass in hand. “Ladies and gentlemen,” said he, “I’m no hand at a speech, but I give you the health of our kind neighbour and good host to-day—Lord Lynborough. Here’s to his lordship!”
“I—I didn’t know he was giving the lunch!” whispered Colonel Wenman.
“Is it his lunch?” said Irons, nudging Stillford.
Stillford laughed. “It looks like it. And we can hardly throw him over the hedge after this!”
“Well, he seems to be a jolly good chap,” said Captain Irons.
Lynborough bowed his acknowledgments, and flirted with Miss Gilletson; his face wore a contented smile. Here they all were—and the Marchesa lunched alone on the other side of the field! Here indeed was a new wedge! Here was the isolation at which his diabolical schemes had aimed. He had captured Nab Grange! Bag and baggage they had come over—and left their chieftainess deserted.
Then suddenly—in the midst of his triumph—in the midst too of a certain not ungenerous commiseration which he felt that he could extend to a defeated enemy and to beauty in distress—he became vaguely aware of a gap in his company. Stabb was not there! Yet Stabb had come upon the ground. He searched the company again. No, Stabb was not there. Moreover—a fact the second search revealed—Roger Wilbraham was not there. Roger was certainly not there; yet, whatever Stabb might do, Roger would never miss lunch!
Lynborough’s eyes grew thoughtful; he pursed up his lips. Miss Gilletson noticed that he became silent.
He could bear the suspense no longer. On a pretext of looking for more bottled beer, he rose and walked to the door of the tent.
Under the spreading tree the Marchesa lunched—not in isolation, not in gloom. She had company—and, even as he appeared, a merry peal of laughter was wafted by a favouring breeze across the field of battle. Stabb’s ponderous figure, Roger Wilbraham’s highly recognisable “blazer,” told the truth plainly.