The countenance of the small divine was a study in outraged dignity; that of Lord Drummuir one of supercilious toleration--the toleration of a cat for the unavailing efforts of a mouse to escape its paralysing captor.
"Am I to understand, sir, that you refuse to carry out this special licence at a perfectly appropriate time and place?" said the latter, his voice even but deliberate. "If so, I must ask you for your reasons in writing, that I may forward them with my complaint." He waited a moment, then went on: "You were appointed by the Crown to this charge. A parishioner of yours in possession of a legal licence calls upon you to perform the duties of your office. You refuse, and I refuse to accept your refusal. That, I think, summarises the position between us. But let me remind you, my good sir, that nothing short of reliable information of cause or just impediment can justify a minister of the Church of Scotland in refusing to do the duty for which he is paid by the State. And if, sir, the licence of this house shocks you--as I am told it does--I think this endeavour of a man and a woman to keep within the bounds of so-called respectability should meet your approval. Briefly, my dear sir, you have not a leg to stand upon, and I demand your services at six o'clock this evening."
The little minister rose and made him a courtly bow.
"It shall be as your lordship wishes; but I reserve to myself the right of showing to your lordship that special licences can be used for, as well as against, the Church."
"Wonder where he gets his manners from," commented Lord Drummuir to himself, as the trim figure bowed itself out. "Father must have been someone's valet, I suppose; and that reminds me of Marmaduke's girl. She's true blue, somehow."
So he sat down, filled from top to toe with a wicked elation at his own success in upsetting everybody's plans, and indited the following epistle to his son, as a sort of top note to his manœuvres:
"Dear Boy,--You will be glad to hear that Fantine Le Grand becomes Lady Drummuir this evening at six o'clock. We have agreed that this is better than hunting two thousand pounds through the capitals of Europe, even in company with you. So that is settled. For the rest, I enclose a cheque for two thousand pounds on my bankers. You owe this to Marrion Paul, who is worth the whole batch of you put together. I cannot conceive how you were such a confounded ass as not to see this, but to let her slip through your fingers and leave the poor girl to face the insults of the neighbours, as she is doing; for, of course, her escapade is the talk of the town. My dear Marmaduke, I am ashamed of you!--Your affectionate father, Drummuir.
"Your step-mamma sends you her duty."
He chuckled over the production which he calculated told enough to rouse anger and not enough to satisfy curiosity, and which, while being a regular facer, left the relations between them much as they were.
After which he had himself wheeled to the big hall where the ceremony was to take place, and amused himself vastly by superintending decorations and mystifying Peter, who came in from a day after wild duck, to find the house upside down. It was the sort of situation in which his lordship revelled, and he became almost lachrymose over reminiscences of the past with Jack Jardine, who never moved a muscle, but took the ceremony as a matter of course. Only when Peter, less experienced, asked him what the deuce the old man meant by playing the goat at a moment's notice, he shook his head solemnly, and replied--