The voice was a perfectly soft one, but it brought Peregrine’s head round with a jerk, and made him jump. It belonged to a gentleman who drove a team of blood-chestnuts, and wore a great-coat with fifteen capes. He was addressing an exquisite in an enormously high collar and neck-cloth, who coloured and said: “Oh, be damned to you, Julian!”
As ill-luck would have it, Peregrine’s start had made him tighten the reins involuntarily, and the farmer’s horse began to back. Peregrine stopped him in a moment, but not in time to prevent his right mudguard just grazing the curricle’s left one. He could have sworn aloud from annoyance.
The gentleman in the curricle turned, brows lifted in pained astonishment. “My very good sir,” he began, and then stopped. The astonishment gave place to an expression of resignation. “I might have known,” he said. “After all, you did promise yourself this meeting, did you not?”
It was said quite quietly, but Peregrine, hot with chagrin, felt that it must have drawn all eyes upon himself. Certainly the gentleman in the high collar was leaning forward to look at him across the intervening curricle. He blurted out: “I hardly touched your carriage! I could not help it if I did!”
“No, that is what I complain of,” sighed his tormentor. “I’m sure you could not.”
Very red in the face, Peregrine said: “You needn’t be afraid, sir! This place will no longer do for me, I assure you!”
“But what is the matter? What are you saying, Julian?” demanded Lord Worcester curiously. “Who is it?”
“An acquaintance of mine,” replied the gentleman in the curricle. “Unsought, but damnably recurrent.”
Peregrine gathered up his reins in hands that were by no means steady; he might not find another place, but stay wherehe was he would not. He said: “I shall relieve you of my presence, sir!”
“Thank you,” murmured the other, faintly smiling.