"That means that you've promised to pay," said Vicky. "Or else you've fobbed him off for the moment, and he'll come back."
"It seems to me," said Wally, with a good deal of asperity, "that all you learned at that precious finishing school of yours was to snoop round listening at keyholes. You may think that a smart thing to do, but let me tell you that it isn't at all the clean potato. In fact, it's very dishonourable, that's what it is."
Upon which austere pronouncement he strayed away grandly, but a little uncertainly, in the direction of his bedroom.
Chapter Five
If Wally hoped that his wife was going to turn a blind eye to his latest peccadillo, he was soon undeceived. Though the night might have brought little counsel and less repose to Ermyntrude, it did strengthen her determination to "have it out' with Wally. Mary and Vicky, and probably the Prince too, knew that a highly dramatic scene had been staged in Ermyntrude's bedroom before breakfast on the following morning, for when Ermyntrude succumbed to her emotions she became not only hysterical, but extremely shrill. Anyone at Palings on that Sunday morning would have had to have been very deaf indeed not to have been disturbed by the sound of its mistress's voice, rising higher and higher, and finally breaking into gusty sobs.
When Ermyntrude did not appear to take her place behind the coffee-cups, Mary began to feel uneasy, for although Ermyntrude often indulged in hearty quarrels with Wally, they usually relieved her feelings so much that she was able to face her family, ten minutes later, with all her customary good-humour. When the sinister message was delivered to her that Ermyntrude would not be requiring any breakfast, her spirits sank to their lowest level. It was with an effort that she summoned up a smile to greet the Prince. She told him, in what she hoped was a careless tone, that Ermyntrude had a headache, and was breakfasting in her room. He accepted this information with all the polite concern of one who had not sipped his early tea to the accompaniment of an unleashed female voice reciting, in ruthless crescendo, every sin his host had committed since his marriage.
Mary could not but applaud the correctness of his attitude, and was just beginning to accuse herself of having been unjust to the Prince, when he once more alienated her sympathy by leading their conversation into a channel whither she refused to follow him. Gracefully, delicately, but none the less obviously, Prince Varasashvili was attempting to discover from Miss Cliffe the terms of the late Mr. Fanshawe's will. The Prince, in fact, wanted to know whether Geoffrey Fanshawe's fortune had been left unconditionally to his relict, or whether it was tied up in his daughter.
Restraining an impulse to inform the Prince that the outlay of a small sum at Somerset House would place at his disposal the information that was so necessary to him, Mary returned no sort of reply to his adroit conversational feelers, but offered him instead a second cup of coffee. He spoke of what he must suppose to be Vicky's large expectations, adding with a smile which Mary thought brazen: "She is at all times enchanting, but when it is known that she will have also a fortune when she comes of age - is it not so? - one is astonished that she is not already betrothed! It is very well, however: she sould make what you call a good match, do you not agree?"
"Yes, Vicky's very attractive," responded Mary woodenly.
"You also, Miss Cliffe, are one of the lucky ones, I understand," he continued. "I hear that you, too, are an heiress."