Just at that moment they were relieved from the temporary embarrassment which the mention of Sardanapalus seemed to have caused the party, by the approach of a tall and very handsome man, who came forward with a smile towards where their group was standing. He was military in bearing, and had dark brown hair, with a white moustache; but he hardly looked more than fifty for all that, as Guy judged at once from his erect carriage and the singular youthfulness of both face and figure. That he was a born aristocrat one could see in every motion of his well-built limbs. His mien had that ineffable air of grace and breeding which sometimes marks the members of our old English families. Very much like Cyril, too, Guy thought to himself, in a flash of intuition; very much like Cyril, the way he raised his hat and then smiled urbanely on Mrs. Clifford and Elma. But it was Cyril grown old and prematurely white, and filled full with the grave haughtiness of an honoured aristocrat.
“Why, here’s Colonel Kelmscott!” Mrs. Clifford exclaimed, with a sigh of relief, not a little set at ease by the timely diversion. “We’re so glad you’ve come, Colonel. And Lady Emily too; she’s over yonder, is she? Ah, well, I’ll look out for her. We heard you were to be here. Oh, how kind of you; thank you. No, Elma’s none the worse for her adventure, thank Heaven! just a little shaken, that’s all, but not otherwise injured. And this gentleman’s the brother of the kind friend who was so good to her in the tunnel. I’m not quite sure of the name. I think it’s—-”
“Guy Waring,” the young man interposed blandly. Hardly any one who looked at Colonel Kelmscott’s eyes could even have perceived the profound surprise this announcement caused him. He bowed without moving a muscle of that military face. Guy himself never noticed the intense emotion the introduction aroused in the distinguished stranger. But Mrs. Clifford and Elma, each scanning him closely with those keen grey eyes of theirs, observed at once that, unmoved as he appeared, a thunderbolt falling at Colonel Kelmscott’s feet could not more thoroughly or completely have stunned him. For a second or two he gazed in the young man’s face uneasily, his colour came and went, his bosom heaved in silence; then he roped his moustache with his trembling fingers, and tried in vain to pump up some harmless remark appropriate to the occasion. But no remark came to him. Mrs. Clifford darted a furtive glance at Elma, and Elma darted back a furtive glance at Mrs. Clifford. Neither said a word, and each let her eyes drop to the ground at once as they met the other’s. But each knew in her heart that something passing strange had astonished Colonel Kelmscott; and each knew, too, that the other had observed it.
Mother and daughter, indeed, needed no spoken words to tell these things plainly to one another. The deep intuition that descended to both was enough to put them in sympathy at once without the need of articulate language.
“Yes, Mr. Guy Waring,” Mrs. Clifford repeated at last, breaking the awkward silence that supervened upon the group. “The brother of Mr. Cyril Waring, who was so kind the other day to my daughter in the tunnel.”
The Colonel started imperceptibly to the naked eye again.
“Oh, indeed,” he said, forcing himself with an effort to speak at last. “I’ve read about it, of course; it was in all the papers.... And—eh—is your brother here, too, this afternoon, Mr. Waring?”