"How could I help it? I coughed once before, but you did not hear me."
I glanced for the first time at Maud Devereux, and she inclined her head slightly, as though to intimate that she accepted my explanation.
"It is of no consequence," she said, a little coldly; "we were to blame for talking nonsense. I'm ready for another set now, Olive."
She turned and moved slowly away to the tennis-court without another look at me; but the other girl lingered for a moment.
"I'm so sorry for what I said, Mr. Arbuthnot," she remarked. "Of course I didn't mean it, but it is so dull here that one is bound to talk nonsense sometimes."
I bowed, and I am afraid that there was a decided twinkle in my eyes as I answered, "Pray, don't apologise. You can't imagine how grateful I am for the red hair and other etceteras which are to save me from a broken heart."
She had the grace to blush a little at last, and it made her look uncommonly pretty.
"You're too bad, Mr. Arbuthnot. Good-bye."
And, with a parting glance and smile, she picked up her racket and moved away across the lawn towards Maud Devereux, who had never once looked round.
I let the blind fall again, and turned back towards my chair. I had hardly reached it before the door opened, and I stood face to face with my grandfather, Colonel Sir Francis Devereux.