“Eh?” ejaculated Freddy, startled. “You don’t mean to tell me they are at Arnside?”
“Yes, yes, they have been there since yesterday, and it is too dreadful, Freddy!”
“Good God, I should rather think so!” he agreed, much struck. “Why, if I hadn’t met you, I should have walked smash into them! You know, Kitty, the old gentleman must be in pretty queer stirrups! Unless he’s been on the mop, and that don’t seem likely. Well, what I mean is, he must be dicked in the nob to want such a set of gudgeons at Arnside! Mind, I don’t say Hugh ain’t a clever fellow: daresay he is; but you can’t deny he’s a dead bore!”
“Yes, he is!” agreed Miss Charing, with enthusiasm. “And, which is worse, he’s a saintly bore, Freddy!”
“Devilish!” agreed Freddy. “Know what he said to me the last time he took a bolt to the village? Why, just because he saw me coming away from the Great-Go, he started to moralize about the evils of gaming! Seemed to think I was a regular leg, which, as I told him, is a dashed silly thing to think, because for one thing it ain’t at all the thing, and for another you have to be a curst clever fellow to be a leg! What’s brought him to Arnside?”
“Uncle Matthew,” replied Kitty. “He is making his Will!”
“He is? You don’t mean he’s had notice to quit at last?”
“Of course he has not, but he chooses to think so!” said Kitty.
“No need to put yourself in a pucker,” said Freddy kindly. “Been saying it any time these past ten years! Who’s he leaving his money-bags to?”
“To me—upon conditions!”