“Just as well we didn’t go to meet ’em,” murmured Aughtlone on the threshold of the entrance hall, smiling above his half-rolled cigarette. “I don’t see much of the place these days, but I’m expected to hold to speed limits and consider my tenants’ nerves on the King’s highway when I am here. Lorton, of course, is an outlaw by instinct”—Lorton was the chauffeur. “He’s been enjoying himself. To-morrow I shall be requested to restock the poultry yards of four villages and subscribe largely to the cottage hospital, after his devastating passage.”
Brakespear, sitting on the top step with his arms about an aged setter, chuckled softly. “You always had a veneration for the law, Tony,” he said, “even in the far-off days when we were cadets and discussed the theory of war——” He raised one finger. “Hark! That’s Jerome. I recognise his dulcet tones.” He stood up shading his eyes. “They’re all there—Mayhew, Longridge, Foster; where’s Jerome? I can hear him.... Oh, there he is! At least, there are his feet sticking up out of the stern-sheets. We’re going to have our dinner-party after all, Tony.”
The car swung round the last curve with a splutter of gravel, and slowed down as it approached the door. The occupants of the back seats appeared to be engaged with a struggling object in the bottom of the car, but gradually the turmoil subsided, and four flushed, grinning faces appeared over the side. The car stopped and the passengers emerged, disentangling suit-cases, fishing-rods, and golf-clubs from the rugs. The chauffeur sat like a graven image with the expression of a man who has done his best to instruct and entertain an audience without hope of either recompense or acknowledgment on this side of the grave.
“Nous sommes arrivés,” crowed the stout Jerome, still panting from his exertions; together they passed through into the lofty panelled hall in a babble of chaff and laughter. “The stars in their courses fought for us. We are reunited, my children, after—how many years is it? Very clever of you to arrange it.” “Tony,” said another, “that chauffeur of yours flicked your old bus along to some tune. He’s a star-turn.”
Aughtlone nodded resignedly. “He’s supposed to be suffering from shell-shock and a piece of shrapnel in the apex of the heart. You wouldn’t somehow suspect it, would you? Bag anything?”
“Only a hen,” said Foster, surrendering his suit-case to the butler and exploring amid decanters and a siphon on a side table. “D.D.[5] She lost her nerve and tried to nip across the road. Say when, Jerry....”
The stout one accepted the long tumbler. “Thanks.... Heigh-ho! Very nice too.... Yes, that was all the damage.” He contemplated their host over the rim of his glass. “You appear to own half the county, Tony—— don’t grudge us a hen.”
“I grudge you nothing,” replied Aughtlone. He surveyed his guests affectionately. “It’s so jolly good getting you all together like this—at least, all of us that are——”
“Quite ...” said Foster, with a sudden note of seriousness in his tone.
“You look hot,” said Brakespear, changing the conversation, himself immaculate in white flannels, with sleekly brushed head.