Coombe had grasped the opportunity. There had come a lull, Coombe seized on it, he began a story in a loud voice. It was about a deal in some shares. Coombe, in his eagerness to talk, grew involved, he floundered. He appealed to Sir Josiah, Sir Josiah who frowned, remembering that he had instructed Coombe that there was to be no "shop." Coombe saw the frown and got more mixed than before, Sir Josiah had let him down. He turned to Jobson, but Jobson had no help to offer.
"Anyhow, there it was, Munston bought seven thousand and fifty and Lockyer I forget how many, and the bottom fell out of the market see, ha, ha."
"Now that is very interesting, very interesting indeed, Mr.—er—Groom—my dear Allan, you and I are not business men, Mr. Groom here is a business man, it is quite interesting to hear these stories, eh? Of course we don't understand 'em, Allan, because, as I say, we are not business men. I have no doubt but that it is an excellent story, but I don't understand it, no, be gad, I don't see the point. It's the same with golfing stories, they may be deuced funny, but when you don't understand them, well you don't, and that's all there is to say to it. Which reminds me of Normandyke—you remember the Duke of Normandyke, my love? His place at Clamberwick was recalled to me by this little place of yours. Of course your home, elegant though it is, is a mere cottage in comparison; Clamberwick is one of the great houses—" and so on and so on, belittling his daughter's house with cheerful patronage and intense superiority, till the colour flamed into Kathleen's cheeks, born of the generous indignation in her heart. She slipped her hand under the table and her cool white fingers closed round Sir Josiah's thick old hand, and pressed it in silent sympathy, love and gratitude.
"I understand, my dear, I understand," the old gentleman whispered. "This Clamberwick may be a great place, my dear, and beyond an old fellow like me, but I'd give you ten such places if I could, and you'd be fit to reign over the lot of 'em."
"I—I wouldn't exchange Homewood for all the Clamberwicks in the world. You made it for us and gave it to us, and I love it for its own and the giver's sake."
She would not tell Allan to-night, she watched Allan. He looked, she thought, a little unhappy, this house party was weighing on his mind. No, she would not tell him to-night, she would wait till after they were all gone. She would keep her promise, of course, and when Harold Scarsdale had gone, when they had bidden one another farewell, and it would be for the last time, she would tell him that it must be for the last time, and as he was a gentleman he would understand and so—so when she told Allan, she would be able to tell him that she had seen the man again, that he had come and gone, and this time forever.
She felt easier, lighter and happier now she had made up her mind. She went to the drawing room and played and sang. Scarsdale, beside the piano, watched her, he turned her music. Now and again he spoke to her, reminding her of some song that called up the past.
"Won't you sing one of them to me, Kathleen?"
"No, no, not to-night, please don't ask me, I—I don't want to think of the past. I told you—there is no past—I burned it with the old letters—it is ashes now." Her lips trembled as she looked up at him and smiled at him. "It is better so, is it not? You know it is. So to-night I shall sing the new songs, the old ones belong to the past and are dead with it."
"If I could only think as you think, or do you think as you speak, Kathleen, do you believe what you say?"