"Another!"
Mrs. Pett glanced at the clock.
"Lord Wisbeach is coming to lunch."
"Lord Wisbeach!" cried Ann. "He doesn't know Jimmy."
"Eugenia informed me in London that he was one of your best friends, James."
Ann looked helplessly at Jimmy. She was conscious again of that feeling of not being able to cope with Fate's blows, of not having the strength to go on climbing over the barriers which Fate placed in her path.
Jimmy, for his part, was cursing the ill fortune that had brought Lord Wisbeach across his path. He saw clearly that it only needed recognition by one or two more intimates of Jimmy Crocker to make Ann suspect his real identity. The fact that she had seen him with Bayliss in Paddington Station and had fallen into the error of supposing Bayliss to be his father had kept her from suspecting until now; but this could not last forever. He remembered Lord Wisbeach well, as a garrulous, irrepressible chatterer who would probably talk about old times to such an extent as to cause Ann to realise the truth in the first five minutes.
The door opened.
"Lord Wisbeach," announced Mr. Crocker.
"I'm afraid I'm late, Mrs. Pett," said his lordship.