“Much rather you came, if it’s all the same to you. Awfully jolly if you would.”
“I would rather not come, thank you, Mr Hammond.”
Basil Carter came forward. I was really glad of his interference, though I would rather he had been a little more sensible.
“Miss Norah will certainly not come with you, Hammond. And, in order that you may not annoy her with your importunities, perhaps it would be as well that I should tell you at once that to-night, at the Gaiety Theatre, Miss Norah will share my box.”
At once Mr Purchase contradicted him.
“Do you wish to quarrel with me, Basil? Because, if not, I must ask you to refrain from persisting in such statements. Already I have borne them nearly as long as I can. Permit me to inform you, Hammond, that it is my box which will be honoured by Miss Norah’s presence.”
“You haven’t the faintest ground for such an assertion. To begin with, you haven’t a box.”
“I shall have one. And I have this ground, Basil, that the original invitation to Miss Norah came from me.”
“Fiddle-dee-dee!”
Mr Carter snapped his fingers; and they were at it again. Mr Hammond took advantage of their wrangling to press what he appeared to have the audacity to regard as his claims.