Lord Bellingham moved away in a thoughtful mood. He began, for the first time, to realize that he might possibly not succeed in buying up his grandson—a reflection which he had hitherto refused, even in his own mind, to consider a possibility.
However, fate was preparing a delicious revenge for Archy upon his two cousins, and it took a form which not only gave him ecstatic pleasure at the time, but sufficed him for chaffing the two girls during the residue of their lives; and this is how it came about.
The spring had passed, the fall of the Ministry had made it certain that the American war was practically over, and the summer came and waned. But it was not like summer weather, and on a certain August night the air was so sharp upon the northern hills and moors that a fire was not unpleasant in the great hall at Bellingham Castle. Lord Bellingham sat before it, with Mary and Isabel taking turns in reading the London newspapers to him. The news they contained of the abandonment of hostilities was not very agreeable to either of the girls, each of whom punctuated her reading with her own opinions, very much after Archy's manner. Lord Bellingham listened, smiling instead of scowling. The society of his daughter and of his grandchildren had certainly changed the old man's temper and manners, if not his disposition. Presently Lord Bellingham asked:
"Where is my grandson?"
"Indeed, I don't know, grandpapa," replied Mary. "He is the most restless creature I ever saw. He cannot sit down and be quiet and placid like an English gentleman; he must always be off on some sort of an expedition."
Lord Bellingham smiled again. He knew that the instant Archy entered the doors the three young people would gravitate together, although to say a civil word one to the other was strictly against their code.
"There he is now," said Isabel, as steps were heard, and the porter came out from his corner to open the doors.
Instead of Archy, though, there entered a slight, well-made man, of about thirty-five, with a plain but striking face, in which glowed a pair of singularly beautiful black eyes. He was dressed in a handsome riding-suit, and had an air and manner of distinction.
"Is Mr. Archibald Baskerville here?" he asked; and then, seeing the old man and the two girls sitting at the other end of the vast hall in the glowing light of the fire, and the waxlights on a reading-stand, he advanced, removing his three-cornered hat and making a profound and graceful bow, first to the two girls and then to their grandfather.
Lord Bellingham, who had seen much of men and things, recognized in an instant that he saw before him a person of distinction, and, rising from his chair with much dignity, he returned the salutation with a courtly inclination.