Mr. Cuthbert smiled a quietly superior smile, and coolly surveyed Erica as she came in. Dinner was announced almost immediately, and it was not until Mrs. Fane-Smith had been taken down that Lady Caroline brought Mr. Cuthbert to Erica's side to introduce him. “Why, your aunt has never told me your name,” she said, smiling.
“My name is Erica Raeburn,” said Erica, quite unconscious that this was a revelation to every one, and that her aunt had purposely spoken of her everywhere as “my niece.”
Lady Caroline gave a scarcely perceptible start of surprise, and there was a curious touch of doubt and constraint in her voice as she pronounced the “Mr. Cuthbert, Miss Raeburn.” Undoubtedly that name sounded rather strangely in her drawing room, and awoke uncomfortable suggestions.
“Raeburn! Erica Raeburn!” thought Mr. Cuthbert to himself. “Uncommon name in England. Connection, I wonder! Aunt hadn't given her name! That looks odd. I'll see if she has a Scotch accent.”
“Are you staying in Greyshot?” he asked as they went down the broad staircase, with its double border of flowering plants.
“Yes,” said Erica; “I came last week. What lovely country it is about here!”
“Country,” with its thrilled “r,” betrayed her nationality, though her accent was of the slightest. Mr. Cuthbert chuckled to himself, for he thought he had caught Mrs. Fane-Smith tripping, and he was a man who derived an immense amount of pleasure from making other people uncomfortable. As a child, he had been a tease; as a big boy, he had been a bully; as a man, he had become a malicious gossip monger. Tonight he thought he saw a chance of good sport, and directly he had said grace, in the momentary pause which usually follows, he turned to Erica with an abrupt, though outwardly courteous question, carried off with a little laugh.
“I hope you are no relation to that despicable infidel who bears your name, Miss Raeburn?”
Erica's color deepened; she almost annihilated him with a flash from her bright indignant eyes.
“I am Luke Raeburn's daughter,” she said, in her clearest voice, and with a dignity which, for the time, spoiled Mr. Cuthbert's enjoyment.