“I can’t make out what’s wrong with the man,” said General Grampound.
CHAPTER XXXVI
PREPARATIONS
“Mr Fanshawe!”
It was just before the first dinner gong, and Mr Fanshawe was in the billiard-room alone practising strokes. He was horribly nervous and depressed. That nervous depression had seized him which sometimes comes as the herald of disaster, sometimes simply from over-wrought nerves.
Only seven hours or so lay between him and the great moment of his life.
He had done everything that could be done. Larry Lyburn had fallen in with everything, and had declared himself willing to carry out instructions to the minutest detail; he had received a sovereign on account, and the promise of two more on starting. Fly-by-night, a great roan mare, had been inspected and approved. Mr Fanshawe was to drive, and Larry to sit behind.
That the job would most likely lose Larry his place never occurred to that individual, but it did to Mr Fanshawe, and he had stated his intention of taking Mr Lyburn into his service, and pensioning him, if need be, should trouble ensue, to which statement of intention Larry had replied: “Yes, sor.”
Despite all this Mr Fanshawe felt nervous. He would have felt more nervous still had he known that Larry had spent some of his largesse on a bottle of whisky.
“Mr Fanshawe!”