Mary, who saw no reason for such stealth, at once said: "Oh, Uncle Wally, don't forget you were going to ask Mr. White for the shot-gun!"
Ermyntrude thought such a direct approach rather rude, and blushed; but White was at once profuse in apologies. "It slipped my memory," he said. "If you'd only given me a ring I could have brought it over tonight! I'll tell you what, Mrs. Carter, I'll pop across with it first thing in the morning."
"Oh, I'm sure I didn't mean That is, Wally's shooting tomorrow, you see!" said Ermyntrude, flustered. "Naturally, you're very welcome, what with Wally using it so seldom, and that."
Wally spoilt the effect of this generous speech by giving vent to his annoying snigger. "Well, that's not what you said this morning. A nice slating I got for lending you the gun, I can tell you, Harold!"
Ready tears of mortification sprang to Ermyntrude's eyes. Mary saw Steel watching her steadily, a little angry pulse throbbing in his temple, and said quickly: "I suggest we get up a game of snooker! You'll play, won't you, Janet?"
Janet, however, said that she was so bad at it that she would prefer to watch. Steel was more obliging, and the Prince announced that nothing could give him greater pleasure. After a good deal of argument, Janet was persuaded to overcome her diffidence, and everyone but Ermyntrude, Vicky and Alan consented to play. Vicky volunteered to mark, and Alan, refusing to play on the score that the sides were even without him, attached himself to her, and tried to hold her attention with a description of the wealth of sordid misery to be found in the works of Maxim Gorky. The billiard-room was a very large room, one end of it being furnished to constitute what Ermyntrude called a smoking-lounge. Here Ermyntrude ensconced herself, in a deep armchair. Between shots, the Prince stood beside her, conversing in low tones, a circumstance which did not find favour in Steel's eyes.
The game was necessarily a light-hearted affair, for the Prince and White were the only really skilled players, and Janet insisted upon being told continually which ball to aim at, which pocket to put it in, and how to handle her cue. White took no part in the coaching of his daughter, but seized the opportunity afforded by the Prince's patiently instructing her, to draw Wally aside, and say to him in a confidential undertone: "If you're looking for a good thing - mind you, when I say good I mean a regular snip! - I think I can put you on to it."
Wally, who was imbibing his third whisky since dinner, was feeling slightly querulous, and replied in a Complaining voice: "What about that money I lent you?"
"That'll be all right, old man," said White soothingly. "No need for you to worry about that."
"Oh, there isn't, isn't there? That's what you think, but I don't, Nice to-do there'd be if Ermy found out about it."