CHAPTER THE THIRD
ALL SORTS OF KINGDOMS
I
Tabs had dressed himself with more than ordinary care. He was rather amused at his self-consciousness in having done so, and a little disdainful of it. Yet he knew that in the winning of a woman the strategy of clothes has its value; he had no intention of losing a trick by negligence. It was nine o'clock when he sat down to breakfast; within two hours he would be seeing Terry.
It was a gay morning, lacquered with sunshine; bustling breezes made young leaves of trees in the little Square murmurous. Ever since he had wakened he had been listening to the gossiping chirp of congregated sparrows and the rolling boom of tumultuous traffic. At intervals across the upland of roofs there had drifted to him the far-blown chime of bells and the slower music of clocks striking. It was like an orchestra scraping its chairs and tuning up before crashing into the overture of the happier world.
Lying beside his plate as he came down he saw a single letter. It was addressed to him in an unfamiliar feminine hand. He picked it up and ex
amined it carefully with the air of a connoisseur. So long as a letter remains unopened, especially when it is to a bachelor from an unknown woman, it retains an atmosphere of adventure. Up to a point he resented the intrusion. This morning his thoughts should have been so utterly Terry's. And yet he was piqued by it.
He slit the envelope. The letter-head was embossed with a crest quite unknown to any but the most modern heraldry. He read:—
Dear Lord Taborley: