“If I seem pale, cousin, you should rather blame the extraordinary announcement in today’s Gazette. It has given me a shock; I shan’t deny it has given me a shock.”
“But, Crosby,” said his lordship plaintively, “were you really sure that you would outlive me?”
“In the course of nature I might expect to,” replied Mr Drelincourt, too much absorbed in his disappointment to consider his words. “I can give you ten years, you must remember.”
Rule shook his head. “I don’t think you should build on it,” he said. “I come of distressingly healthy stock, you know.”
“Very true,” agreed Mr Drelincourt. “It is a happiness to all your relatives.”
“I see it is,” said his lordship gravely.
“Pray don’t mistake me, Marcus!” besought his cousin. “You must not suppose that your demise could occasion in me anything but a sense of the deepest bereavement, but you’ll allow a man must look to the future.”
“Such a remote future!” said his lordship. “It makes me feel positively melancholy, my dear Crosby.”
“We must all hope it may be remote,” said Crosby, “but you cannot fail to have observed how uncertain is human life. Only to think of young Frittenham, cut off in the very flower of his youth by the overturning of his curricle! Broke his neck, you know, and all for a wager.”
The Earl laid down his knife and fork, and regarded his relative with some amusement. “Only to think of it!” he repeated. “I confess, Crosby, what you say will add—er—piquancy to my next race. I begin to see that your succession to my shoes—by the way, cousin, you are such a judge of these matters, do, I beg of you, tell me how you like them?” He stretched one leg for Mr Drelincourt to look at.