“Yes—it’s all right,” Raikes rejoined in most matter-of-course tone, and then he stepped to the window, and puffed a very deep breath indeed, and glanced from the straight line of the street to the heavens, with whom, injured as he was, he felt more at home now that he knew them capable of miracles.
“Is it a bad joke played upon me?” said Evan.
Raikes upset a chair. “It’s quite childish. You’re made a gentleman for life, and you ask if it’s a joke played upon you! It’s maddening! There—there goes my hat!”
With a vehement kick, Mr. Raikes despatched his ancient head-gear to the other end of the room, saying that he must have some wine, and would; and disdainful was his look at Evan, when the latter attempted to reason him into economy. He ordered the wine; drank a glass, which coloured a new mood in him; and affecting a practical manner, said:
“I confess I have been a little hurt with you, Harrington. You left me stranded on the desert isle. I thought myself abandoned. I thought I should never see anything but the lengthening of an endless bill on my landlady’s face—my sole planet. I was resigned till I heard my friend ‘to-lool!’ this morning. He kindled recollection. But, this is a tidy Port, and that was a delectable sort of young lady that you were riding with when we parted last! She laughs like the true metal. I suppose you know it’s the identical damsel I met the day before, and owe it to for my run on the downs—I’ve a compliment ready made for her.”
“You think that letter written in good faith?” said Evan.
“Look here.” Mr. Raikes put on a calmness. “You got up the other night, and said you were a tailor—a devotee of the cabbage and the goose. Why the notion didn’t strike me is extraordinary—I ought to have known my man. However, the old gentleman who gave the supper—he’s evidently one of your beastly rich old ruffianly republicans—spent part of his time in America, I dare say. Put two and two together.”
But as Harrington desired plain prose, Mr. Raikes tamed his imagination to deliver it. He pointed distinctly at the old gentleman who gave the supper as the writer of the letter. Evan, in return, confided to him his history and present position, and Mr. Raikes, without cooling to his fortunate friend, became a trifle patronizing.
“You said your father—I think I remember at old Cudford’s—was a cavalry officer, a bold dragoon?”
“I did,” replied Evan. “I told a lie.”