"Excuse me just one moment, Mrs. Potten. I shan't remember if I don't make a note of it."
The note that Bingham jotted down was: "Sat. Lady Dashwood, dinner 8 o'clock."
Boreham glanced keenly and suspiciously at him, for he heard him murmur aloud the words he was writing.
Boreham did not see that Bingham had any right to the invitation.
"I've forgotten my waterproof," exclaimed Mrs. Potten, as she went down the steps.
Bingham dived into the hall after it and having found it in the arms of a servant, he hurried back to Mrs. Potten.
"I do believe I've dropped my handkerchief," remarked Mrs. Potten, as he started her down the drive at a brisk trot.
"Are you afraid of this pace?" asked Bingham evasively, for he did not intend to return to the house.
Boreham gazed after them with his beard at a saturnine angle. "You couldn't expect her to remember everything," he muttered to himself.
The sky was low, heavy and grey, and the air was chilly and yet close, and everything—sky, half-leafless trees, the gravelled drive too—seemed to be steaming with moisture. The words came to Boreham's mind: