“Now, look here, John Huish,” he said, “I won’t quarrel about the past and this clandestine match, for perhaps, if I had been situated as you were, I should have done the same; but there is something I want cleared up.”
“Let us clear it up at once then,” said Huish, smiling. “What is it?”
“Well, there are some sinister reports about you—you see, I speak plainly.”
“Yes, of course. Go on.”
“Well, they say commonly that you have been playing out of the square at the clubs; that you’ve been expelled from two, and that your conduct has been little better than that of a blackleg. John Huish, as a gentleman and my brother-in-law, how much of this is true? Stop a moment,” he added hastily. “I know, old man, what it is myself to be pinched for money, and how a fellow might be tempted to do anything shady to get some together to keep up appearances. If there has been anything queer it must be forgiven; but you must give me your word as a man that for the future all shall be right.”
“My dear Dick,” cried Huish, “I give you my word that all in the future shall be square, as you term it; and I tell you this, that if any man had spoken such falsehoods about my wife’s brother, I should have knocked him down. There isn’t a word of truth in these reports, though I must confess they have worried me a great deal. Now, will you shake hands?”
“That I will,” cried Dick eagerly; “and I tell you now that I am glad that you have thrown dust in our eyes as you have. I always liked you, Huish, and you were about the only man from whom I never liked to borrow money.”
“Why?” said Huish, smiling.
“Because I was afraid of losing a friend. Come up now, for Gertrude will be in a fidget to know what we have been saying.—Gertrude, my dear,” he said as they re-entered the drawing-room, “it’s all right.”
An hour later Dick parted from the young couple at the little house they had taken in Westbourne Road, and cabbed back, to send her ladyship into a fainting fit by the announcement that his sister and her husband had been at his uncle’s.