“You are going to Bridport House to have a word with my kinsman. And if you’re true blue—and I know you are that—you will make him see honest daylight. And it ought to be easy, because he has only to look at you—the finest thing up to now that has found its way on to this old planet, in order to realize that he’s right up against it.”
He knew his own mind and she didn’t know hers. Such a man was terribly hard to resist.
“He says any morning at twelve. I suggest tomorrow.”
“You insist?” She was struggling helplessly in meshes of her own weaving.
“I insist. And my last word is that if you let the old beast down us, as of course he’ll try to do, I go back to B. C. and remain a single man to the end of my days. And I’m not out for that, as long as there is half a chance of something better. So that’s that.” In the style of the great lover he laid a hand on each shoulder, looked into the troubled eyes and kissed her. “And now, if you please, we will witch the world with noble horsemanship.”
CHAPTER VIII
A BUSY MORNING
I
The next morning was a busy one for his Grace, and it also marked a tide in the affairs of Bridport House. Soon after ten the ball opened with the inauspicious arrival of Lady Wargrave. The head of the Family had just unfolded his newspaper and put on his spectacles when her ladyship was announced.
As the redoubtable Charlotte entered the room, the hard glitter of her eyes and the forward thrust of a dominant chin were ominous indeed. Bitter experience made her brother only too keenly alive to these portents.
Without any beating about the bush she came at once to the point.