There was an uncomfortable silence. “I was counting on his support,” said Mr. Bindane, presently. “Without it I don’t know whether I would be inclined to find the necessary capital.”
Lord Blair instantly accepted the challenge. “Then the project will have to be shelved,” he replied, sharply: and when he spoke sharply there was no doubt about his being the “Great Man.”
Benifett Bindane, however, appeared to be entirely unmoved. “I don’t think Mr. Lane is as happy now as he was when he lived in the desert,” he mused.
Lord Blair rose to his feet. “Please regard his services as unavailable, quite unavailable, for this project,” he said deliberately, “except in an occasional advisory capacity.”
Mr. Bindane had also risen, and now the two stood facing one another. Outwardly the trim, eager little man and the tall, lifeless figure before him might have appeared to the eye to be friendly enough; but a reader of hearts would have detected in them two opposing forces arrayed for battle, the one having in mind the extension of the prestige of England, the other the increase of his private fortune.
Meanwhile, in the library, another of life’s little plays was being enacted.
Lord Barthampton had come to the Residency to invite Lady Muriel to a picnic on the following day, and she had just disappointed him by saying that she was already engaged. He had arrived with such a flourish, spanking up to the door in his high dogcart, his little “tiger” leaping to the cob’s head as he pulled up, and the morning sunshine sparkling on the harness and the varnished woodwork; and now, after waiting a very long time in the rather severe library, Lady Muriel had come in and had told him that every moment of her time was booked up apparently for weeks to come.
“I never seem to get the chance to say half a dozen words to you,” he grunted, feeling thoroughly put out. “You women are all so mad about having a good time that you can’t spare a moment for us lonely fellows.”
Muriel was quite concerned at his depression, and asked him whether he would have a glass of port or a whiskey-and-soda.
“No, I will not,” he said, with a gloomy laugh. “I’m on the water-waggon for your sake, and you don’t even say you’re glad.”