"Oh, I say—lost our lord! What's the matter with him?"
Jack remained silent, unable to answer his query. Geoff pulled himself together.
"It can't be helped," he said briefly. "Winborough and I have been expressing our candid opinion of one another, and one of the results is, as Jack surmises, that the sittings for the bust are indefinitely postponed. Where is Evarne? Hasn't she returned yet?"
"No, I expect she went a little way with Maudie."
"I'm glad she didn't see that brute," announced Geoff, going to the window and looking frowningly after the motorcar that was bearing his cousin swiftly down the road.
"What a fine old row," murmured Pallister. Then keen regret for the abandoned life-mask swept across his mind, and he cried impulsively: "Oh, I say, though! What a beastly disappointment it all is. Don't you think you're a jolly nuisance, Geoff, spoiling all our arrangements so calmly?"
Geoff turned sharply round at this piece of impertinence, but ere the angry retort had passed his lips, his eye fell upon Jack, who was sitting silently apart, both his attitude and expression betraying the uttermost dejection. Geoff crossed over and stood before his friend.
"I am sorry, Jack," he said simply.
"Don't trouble about me," was the somewhat sullen answer. "Luck is always against me—always has been—always will be, I suppose. He won't write. He was only doing it to oblige you. Of course I knew that well enough. Now I shall stick in the mud forever, I suppose. I never seem to get a chance like other fellows. Well—never mind! Don't let's talk about it any more."
Here Pallister laid his hand somewhat timidly on Geoff's arm.