"Well, I don't take to him," said the other, unwillingly. "He isn't my sort of man."
"And Mademoiselle Julie--you think nothing but well of her? I don't like discussing a lady; but, you see, with Lady Henry to manage, one must feel the ground as one can."
Sir Wilfrid looked at his companion, and then stretched his legs a little farther towards the fire. The lamp-light shone full on his silky eyelashes and beard, on his neatly parted hair, and the diamond on his fine left hand. The young man beside him could not emulate his easy composure. He fidgeted nervously as he replied, with warmth:
"I think she has had an uncommonly hard time, that she wants nothing but what is reasonable, and that if she threw you off the scent, Sir Wilfrid, with regard to Warkworth, she was quite within her rights. You probably deserved it."
He threw up his head with a quick gesture of challenge. Sir Wilfrid shrugged his shoulders.
"I vow I didn't," he murmured. "However, that's all right. What do you do with yourself down in Essex, Jacob?"
The lines of the young man's attitude showed a sudden unconscious relief from tension. He threw himself back in his chair.
"Well, it's a big estate. There's plenty to do."
"You live by yourself?"
"Yes. There's an agent's house--a small one--in one of the villages."