The pause sobered Kit.
"Yes," continued Alington, "he had a moment before asked me to change him some money for small counters, and that left me with only a few small ones. Luckily, he will remember seeing me withdraw and substitute my stake. You and Lady Haslemere would have been wise to consult him before taking this somewhat questionable step of watching me. A fault of judgment—a mere fault of judgment."
Kit, figuratively speaking, threw up her hand. The desperate hope that Alington was lying was no longer tenable.
"And I await your apology," he added.
There was a long silence. Kit was not accustomed to apologize to anybody for anything. Her indifference to this man, except in so far as he could financially serve them, had undergone a startling transformation in the last hour. Indifference had given place first to anger at his insolence, then to fear. His placid, serene face had become to her an image of some infernal Juggernaut, whose car rolled on over bodies of men, yet whose eyelash never quivered. Pride battled with fear in her mind, fury with prudence. And Juggernaut (butler no longer), contrary to his ascetic habit, lit a cigarette.
"Well?" he said, when he judged that the pause was sufficiently prolonged.
Kit had sat down again in her chair, and was conscious only of two things—this inward struggle, and an absorbing hatred of the man seated opposite her.
"Supposing I refuse to apologize?" she asked at length.
"I shall regret it very much," he said; "you probably will regret it more. Come, Lady Conybeare, by what right do you make an enemy of me?"
Again there was silence. Kit knew very well how everyone would talk if this detestable business became public, which she understood to be the threat contained in Alington's words, and knew also that a rupture between Jack and him, which must inevitably follow, would not be likely to lead to their financial success in this business of the mines.