He seemed inclined to brood over the advantages of a classical education, but his brother brought him back to the point. “What the deuce has Nemesis to do with Sherry’s going to Bath?” he demanded.
“You wouldn’t understand,” said Ferdy. “Think I’ll go and see Gil.”
“Dash it, Ferdy, you can’t go off like that!” expostulated Mr Westgate.
“Yes, I can,” replied Ferdy. “Got a fancy to see Gil. Very knowing fellow. Come back again later.”
“You know what, Duke?” said Mr Westgate, watching Ferdy wend his way to the door. “I’ve never seen poor Ferdy so bosky in all my life! He’ll be taken up by the Watch, that’s what’ll happen to him!”
This ignominious fate did not, however, overtake Ferdy. He reached Stratton Street unmolested, to be met by the same intelligence which had greeted Lord Wrotham earlier in the day. He was even more dashed than his lordship had been, but he reached the same decision. For the second time that day Mr Ford ushered one of Mr Ringwood’s cronies into his parlour for the purpose of writing a note to him.
It cost Ferdy time and profound thought to achieve a letter that should explain the whole situation to Mr Ringwood; but when he presently read the elegantly phrased document over to himself he was not ill-pleased with it. To his mind it contrived both to impress Mr Ringwood with a sense of the urgency of the situation and to reassure him on the question of the writer’s selfless loyalty to the cause at stake. It stated clearly that Ferdy would accompany his cousin to Bath, but it became a trifle involved after that, a dark reference to the possible need of a second leaving Mr Ringwood to infer that Ferdy felt there was a strong likelihood of Sherry’s calling him out: a contingency which he explained as being due to the machinations of a mysterious agency whose name might be discovered on application to the Honourable Marmaduke Fakenham. It struck Ferdy, when he came to this portion of the missive, that it would be highly undesirable for Mr Ringwood to make any such application, so he appended a terse postscript: Better not.
The composition of such a literary effort naturally made it necessary for the Honourable Ferdy to seek a little stimulant. Fortunately, there was some brandy in one of the decanters on the sideboard. Ferdy poured it into a rummer, drank it off, and then, for he was very meticulous in all matters of good ton, added a second postscript: Took a glass of brandy.
He departed from Mr Ringwood’s lodging, feeling that no action befitting a man of honour had been left undone; and, the brandy having made him pot-valiant, betook himself to Half Moon Street. The house was in darkness, and it was some time before he could obtain a response to his insistent knocking. It seemed to him a very peculiar circumstance that no one should answer the door in Sherry’s house, and he was just wondering whether he could have made a mistake in the number when a window was flung up on the second floor, and Sherry’s voice, rather sleepy and extremely irate, asked who the devil was there.
Ferdy gazed up at the vague outline of his cousin’s head and said: “Hallo, Sherry, dear boy! What the deuce are you doing up there?”