Then was given in the best possible form the little drama of the talk in the garden. No shade of Mr. Temple Barholm's characteristics was lost. Palliser gave occasionally an English attempt at the reproduction of his nasal twang, but it was only a touch and not sufficiently persisted in to become undignified.
“I can't do it,” he said. “None of us can really do it. When English actors try it on the stage, it is not in the least the real thing. They only drawl through their noses, and it is more than that.”
The people of Detchworth Grange were not noisy people, but their laughter was unrestrained before the recital was finished. Nobody had gone so far as either to fear or to hope for anything as undiluted in its nature as this was.
“Then he won't give us a chance, the least chance,” cried Lucy and Amabel almost in unison. “We are out of the running.”
“You won't get even a look in—because you are not 'ladies,'” said their brother.
“Poor Jem Temple Barholm! What a different thing it would have been if we had had him for a neighbor!” Mr. Grantham fretted.
“We should have had Lady Joan Fayre as well,” said his wife.
“At least she's a gentlewoman as well as a 'lady,'” Mr. Grantham said. “She would not have become so bitter if that hideous thing had not occurred.”
They wondered if the new man knew anything about Jem. Palliser had not reached that part of his revelation when the laughter had broken into it. He told it forthwith, and the laughter was overcome by a sort of dismayed disgust. This did not accord with the rumors of an almost “nice” good nature.
“There's a vulgar horridness about it,” said Lucy.