“My young friend Shotter is, I believe, a near neighbour of yours,” he said, when the sole meunière was no more.
“He lives next door.”
“Indeed? Then you see a great deal of him, no doubt?”
“I never see him.”
“A most delightful young fellow,” said Lord Tilbury, sipping cider.
Kay looked at him stonily.
“Do you think so?” she said.
Lord Tilbury’s last doubts were removed. He felt that all was for the best in the best of all possible worlds. Like some joyous reveller out of Rabelais, he raised his glass with a light-hearted flourish. He looked as if he were about to start a drinking chorus.
“Excellent cider, this, Braddock,” he boomed genially. “Most excellent.”
Willoughby Braddock, who had been eying his own supply of that wholesome beverage with sullen dislike, looked at him in pained silence; and Sam, who had been sitting glumly, listening without interest to the prattle of one of the shingled girls, took it upon himself to reply. He was feeling sad and ill used. That incident before dinner had distressed him. Moreover, only a moment ago he had caught Kay’s eye for an instant across the table, and it had been cold and disdainful. He welcomed the opportunity of spoiling somebody’s life, and particularly that of an old ass like Lord Tilbury, who should have been thinking about the hereafter instead of being so infernally hearty.