Lord Wrotham staggered to a chair, and sank into it. Anxious to make amends, Mr Fakenham poured out some ale, and pushed the tankard towards him. He took a pull, and sighed deeply. “My God, I thought — Sherry, I have wronged you!”
“Well, I don’t mind,” said the Viscount handsomely. “Got too much else to think about. Besides, you’re always doing it.”
“Sherry,” said Wrotham, fixing him with a hungry gaze, “I insulted you! If you want satisfaction, I will give it to you.”
“If you think it would afford me satisfaction to stand up for you to blow a hole through my chest, you’re mightily mistaken, George!” said Sherry frankly. “I’ll tell you what: if you don’t stop trying to pick quarrels with your best friends, you won’t have any left to you!”
“I think I am going mad!” said Wrotham, with a groan, and dropping his head in his hands. “I thought you was gone into Kent to steal a march on me with the Incomparable!” He raised his head again, and directed one of his fiery stares at Mr Fakenham. “It was you who told me so!” he cried accusingly. “Now, upon my soul, Ferdy — ”
“All a mistake!” said Ferdy feebly. “Never at my best before noon!”
“Well, as a matter of fact, that’s what I did do,” said Sherry, with a candour bordering, in the opinion of his friends, on the foolhardy. “Only she wouldn’t have me.”
“She refused you!” Wrotham cried, his haggard countenance suddenly radiant.
“That’s what I’m telling you. It’s my belief she’s got better game in view than either of us, George. If she can bring him up to scratch, she’ll have Severn, you mark my words!”
“Sherry!” thundered the distraught lover, springing to his feet and clenching his fists, “one word of disparagement of the loveliest, the most divine, the most perfect woman, and I call you out to answer for it!”