Tabs stood with his hand held out. Braithwaite made no motion to accept it; and yet his expression was generous. "I can't shake your hand as Terry's husband, Lord Taborley. I'm not married to her."
Lady Dawn sprang to her feet and came between the two tall men. "Not married to her! But you intend to marry her? You told us you were married."
Braithwaite was still smiling. "I am." To their amazement he slipped his arm about Ann and kissed her sleepy, tender mouth. "Terry is safe with your Ladyship's sister. We took her there when she arrived last night."
He turned to Tabs. "You said that I was the better man. I'm not. It was your sense of duty that always urged me. I have to thank your Lordship for the greatest happiness that can befall any man. You made me see it as my greatest happiness, when I was in danger of becoming a cad. There was one thing you said to me that sank into my mind. 'You'll never succeed, however great your courage, unless you start with your honor solvent.' You saved my honor. I didn't like your methods. But I thank you with all my heart now. If it hadn't been for you, neither Ann nor I would have come safely to our journey's end. I think we'd both like to shake your hand."
XI
It was two hours later. They were finishing their breakfast in the open, on the balcony of the Hyde Park Hotel. From where they sat they could watch a lawn-mower traveling slowly back and forth, patterning the sward with alternate stripes of different colored greenness. They could smell the acrid juices of newly cut grass. Beyond the islands of flowers and vivid candelabra of trees, they could see the wild fowl of the Serpentine rise and drift like phantoms across the sultry stretch of blueness. Wheels of a water-cart grumbled sleepily against the gravel. Moving through the sunlit shadows of the Row, riders were returning from their early morning gallop.
They were still together—just the two of them. They were romantically self-conscious of the domestic appearance which their twoness caused. Only married couples or very ardent lovers rise, while the lazy world is sleeping, to keep each other company at breakfast. They had not had the heart to disturb the General and Ann in their temporary possession of the little nest-like house.
Lady Dawn was speaking. "So you've done it again."
"What have I done?"