‘Is it quite hopeless, Miss Prioleau? May I not have one dance, only one?’ again he pleaded, with such earnest eyes that Edith Prioleau was touched and on the point of giving way.
‘Why did you cut me the other day, Mr. Larkins?’ suddenly asked Captain Mountcharles, with the idea of creating some diversion.
‘I never cut you’—although I probably shall, and the sooner the better—Herbert was disposed to add. ‘When and where was it?’
‘Near the Moorish Cottage; you were coming out of some soldiers’ quarters.’
‘Oh yes, Sergeant Larkins.’
‘Relations, perhaps,’ the other observed impertinently.
‘Very near and very dear,’ Herbert replied promptly. This was not an occasion on which he would deny his old friends.
‘At any rate you are honest, Mr. Larkins,’ Edith said, with a frank smile, but Herbert knew from the speech that Edith had been also present, and he seemed to understand now why she was so different to him.
‘Honesty is not the exclusive property of high birth, Miss Prioleau, and I can claim at least to have as much as my neighbours.’