"What are you grinning about?" snapped the narrator.
"Just natural imbecility," said Lord Peter. "I say, poor old Cathcart. She was a girl! For the matter of that, I suppose she still is. I don't know why I should talk as if she'd died away the moment I took my eyes off her."
"Horribly self-centered, you are," grumbled Mr. Parker.
"I know. I always was from a child. But what worries me is that I seem to be gettin' so susceptible. When Barbara turned me down—"
"You're cured," said his friend brutally. "As a matter of fact, I've noticed it for some time."
Lord Peter sighed deeply. "I value your candor, Charles," he said, "but I wish you hadn't such an unkind way of putting things. Besides—I say, are they coming out?"
The crowd in Parliament Square was beginning to stir and spread. Sparse streams of people began to drift across the street. A splash of scarlet appeared against the grey stone of St. Stephen's. Mr. Murbles's clerk dashed in suddenly at the door.
"All right, my lord—acquitted—unanimously—and will you please come across, my lord?"
They ran out. At sight of Lord Peter some excited bystanders raised a cheer. The great wind tore suddenly through the Square, bellying out the scarlet robes of the emerging peers. Lord Peter was bandied from one to the other, till he reached the center of the group.
"Excuse me, your grace."