"It's good advice. I'll try." He came to me holding out his hand. "And wish me good luck!"
"You've had as fine a slice of luck to-day as happens to most men. Here's to another!"
He wrung my hand hard. "I've made an ass of myself, I suppose!" That was homage to the etiquette. "I'll remember what you've said. He has a case, by Jove, and a strong one!" He smiled again. "Somehow Margaret's case won, though," he ended.
He went his way—a straight lad and a simple gentleman. He had no idea that any schemes had been afoot, that any wires had been pulled, either for him or against his father—if to get this thing done were indeed against Fillingford. Nor had he any idea that his scruples about family loyalty were to be annihilated by the intervention of a fairy godmother. Jenny had stuck to the romantic color of her scheme. She sent him forth to meet his father with no plea in extenuation, with no proffer of gold wherewith to gild the hated name of Octon. His fight was to be single-handed. So she chose to prove his metal—with, perhaps, a side-thought that the fairy godmother's intervention, coming later, might be more effective—and would certainly gain in picturesqueness! That notion, unflattering maybe, one could not easily dismiss when the workings of her mind were in question. Yet it might be that a finer idea was there—that it was not only Lacey's metal which was to be proved that night. She had said that she was ready to bribe, that she might have to bully—and implied that she was prepared to do both at once, if need be. But had it come across her thoughts that, by divine chance, she might have to do neither? She knew Fillingford's love for his son; she had sent Margaret to met Fillingford that he might see her as she was. She might be minded now to prove if love alone would not serve the turn. The battalions might all be held in leash—and the God of Love himself sent forth as herald to a parley. If Fillingford surrendered to that pleading, the victory would not be so purely Jenny's: but she would, I believed, have the grace to like it better. That it was a less characteristic mode of proceeding had to be admitted: but to-day there would be an atmosphere at the Priory which might incline her to it. She would not force Fillingford, if she need not—neither by threats nor by bribes. Being myself, I suppose, somewhat touched by Amyas Lacey's exaltation, I found myself hoping that she would try—first—the appeal of heart to heart. That she would accept it as final—I knew too much to look for that.
The case could not, in its nature, be so simple. With the appeal of love must come that relief from a greater fear which she had carefully implanted, on which she certainly reckoned. That was in the very marrow of her plan; no romantic fancies could get rid of it. The best excuse for it lay in the fact that it would certainly be useful, and was probably necessary. When things are certainly useful and probably necessary, the world is apt to exhibit toward them a certain leniency of judgment. Jenny did not set herself above the world in moral matters.
I went up to the Priory after dinner, availing myself of Jenny's strictly defined invitation. But up there I made a blunder. I blundered into a room where one person at least did not want me—I am not so sure about the other. Dormer had gone clean out of my head; more serious matters were to the front. Heedlessly I charged into the library; there were he and Jenny! Luckily I seemed to have arrived only at the tail-end of their conversation. "Quite final," were the words I heard from her lips as I opened the door. She was standing opposite Dormer, looking demurely resolute, but quite gentle and friendly. He was looking not much distressed, but most remarkably sulky.
I tried to back out, but she called me in. "Come in, Austin. You're just in time to bid Mr. Dormer good night."
He shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose I'd better be off. I'll pick up the car at the stables."
"Good night. We shall see you again some day soon?"
"I don't know about that. I may go away for a bit—and anyhow I expect to be pretty busy."