But Lottie was not sure. She had observed one fact which had escaped her usually astute parent, and that was that the new chauffeur was a gentleman—and, as such, a suspicious character. An ordinary mechanical mechanic would have been harmless; but a gentleman was a superfluity, and therefore a source of danger. But Lottie hesitated to comment on the fact. Wisdom said, "Take no risks"; feminine curiosity said, "Chance it!" Lottie chanced it, not for the first time in the history of womankind.
II
However dubious the impression which the new chauffeur had made upon Miss Lottingar, it is only fair to state that the impression made by Miss Lottingar and her gallant papa upon the new chauffeur was more dubious still. Pip, who was not an expert where women were concerned,—only an enthusiastic amateur,—made a mental note that Lottie "looked a good sort, and was a rare pretty girl." Being less biassed and more experienced in regard to his own sex, he was nearer the mark in his estimate of her father. The fact that Lottie's complexion was not entirely her own was unrevealed to him, but he did not fail to write down Captain Lottingar as a "bounder." He observed that his employer, though he carefully pronounced "here" "heah," not infrequently called "nothing" "nothink"; and Pip still possessed enough regard for the fetishes of his youth to be conscious of a thrill of positive horror at the spectacle of a man who wore brown boots with a top-hat on Sunday.
Various guests visited Broadoak,—gentlemen with waxed mustaches and loud garments,—most of whom appeared to be intimate friends of Lottie's. They shot Captain Lottingar's rabbits by day, with indifferent success, and played cards most of the night. Much the most interesting of the guests, however, was the gentleman heretofore referred to as "the Honourable." He was more than a guest at Broadoak,—he was almost one of the family. Captain Lottingar slapped him on the back and called him "my boy"; Captain Lottingar's friends addressed him with admiring deference and borrowed money from him; and Miss Lottingar behaved to him in a manner which left no doubt in the minds of casual observers as to the state of her affections.
The Honourable himself was a pleasant but dissipated-looking youth of about two-and-twenty. His stature was small, and his attainments, beyond those indigenous to every well-born and well-bred young Englishman, insignificant; but his appreciation of the pleasures of life was great. He was a good specimen of that type of young man but for whom chorus-girls would be compelled to pay for their own diamonds. Pending the arrival of the time when he would be called upon to assume the office of an hereditary legislator, he was engaged in what he called "seeing life." He did not see much, though he thought he did, for his field of vision was limited; but what he saw he saw thoroughly. He entertained a great admiration for Captain Lottingar, whom he had encountered at a flashy club in town; and any fleeting doubts, derived from the hints of experienced and officious friends, which he might have entertained as to the genuineness of that warrior's pretensions to gentility were at once set at rest when he arrived, in response to a pressing invitation, on a visit to "my old place in Hertfordshire." A ripening friendship with the Principal Boy was now turning his admiration for the name of Lottingar into positive infatuation; and altogether the Honourable Reginald Fitznorton was in that condition usually described as "ready for plucking."
Pip, who did not as a rule concern himself overmuch with his neighbours' affairs, soon became conscious of a distinct feeling of curiosity in regard to his present surroundings. Captain Lottingar one day mentioned to the Honourable in his hearing that the family of Lottingar had inhabited Broadoak Manor, without intermission, from the days of Queen Elizabeth,—a statement which Pip found rather hard to reconcile with the fact that there lay in the garage at the back of the house a notice-board, showing every sign of having been recently uprooted from the grassplot by the front gate, inscribed with the simple legend "To Let." Moreover, one afternoon, while exploring the numerous passages in the house in search of the Principal Boy's fox-terrier, which he had been bidden to catch and wash, Pip made the discovery that, with the exception of the dining-room, library, kitchens, hall and a few bedrooms, Broadoak Manor was a warren of empty rooms destitute of furniture, though a few of the more conspicuous windows were furnished with curtains.
His fellow-menials also were a curiosity-inspiring crew. The establishment, besides Howard, consisted of a not unattractive middle-aged female who cooked; a beetle-browed individual named Briggs, the keeper, who, though inclined to be reticent on matters connected with that exotic biped, the pheasant, was a mine of information on worldly topics, and a perfect encyclopædia of reference in regard to horse-racing; and a pretty but pert maid, who made eyes at Pip, and once, in a moment of inadvertence, addressed the saintly Howard as "Pa." All were on the best of terms, and sat down to poker in the evening with a regularity and cheerfulness which convinced the inexperienced Pip either that servants' halls were not what he had imagined them to be, or that adversity had landed him in a very shady establishment.
However, he discovered one refreshing and self-evident truth in this home of mystery. There was no doubting the fact that the Honourable's courtship of Miss Lottingar (or Miss Lottingar's courtship of the Honourable, if you happened to live on the other side of the curtain) was fast maturing to a definite conclusion. On numerous motor excursions Pip found himself compelled to combine with his duties as chauffeur the highly necessary but embarrassing rôle of gooseberry. Occasionally Miss Lottingar attempted to drive the car herself, but as a rule Pip had entire charge, the young people sitting together in close companionship in the tonneau behind. Occasionally the car would be stopped, and Pip would be kindly bidden to smoke his pipe, what time the Honourable escorted Miss Lottingar into a neighbouring plantation, to watch hypothetical pheasants feeding; or Miss Lottingar took the Honourable up a by-path, to show him a view which had sprung into existence within the last five minutes.
Pip, simple soul, knew nothing and cared less about the gentle art of husband-hunting. He felt himself irresistibly drawn towards this young couple. He abandoned himself to sentimental sympathy, and drove his car or smoked his pipe with his eyes fixed resolutely before him, thinking of Elsie and wondering if his own turn would ever come.
One day, as they were returning from a long afternoon's spin, the car suddenly slowed down to a stop, and with the complete and maddening finality of its kind refused to move another inch. Pip divested himself of his coat and disappeared beneath the vehicle, emerging after a brief supine scrutiny to announce that the necessary repairs would involve the assistance of a blacksmith and take an hour and a half to execute. The couple received this announcement with marked composure, and left Pip to wrestle with the car, merely bidding him call for them at the "George" at Lindley, two miles ahead, on his way home.