“Good morning, Philip,” said the First Baron.
“Mornin’, father,” said the heir to the barony.
“Philip,” said the First Baron, “your mother tells me that you have declined to accompany her and Adela Rocklaw to the Albert Hall this afternoon to hear Paderewski.”
The heir to the barony knitted the intellectual forehead that was his by inheritance.
“Not declined, you know, exactly. It’s a bit of a mix. I thought the concert was next Saturday.” Mr. Philip was a slow and rather heavy young man, but his air was quite sweet and humble, and not without a sort of tacit deference for both parents. “Fact is, I was keepin’ next Saturday.”
“Why not go this afternoon as you have got wrong in the date? Your mother has been at so much trouble, and I am sure Adela Rocklaw will be disappointed.”
“Unfortunately I’ve fixed up this other thing.”
“Engaged to a music hall, I understand.”
“Pantomime at Drury Lane,” said Philip the sombre.
“Quite so.” The Proconsul, like other great men, was slightly impatient of meticulous detail in affairs outside his orbit. “Hardly right, is it, to disappoint Adela Rocklaw, especially after your mother”—Mother, still mounted on the Louis Quinze, sat with eyelids lowered but very level—“has taken so much trouble? At least I, at your age, should not have thought so.”