“I also, Miss Norah,” said Mr Carter, taking my hand before I knew that he meant to offer me his. “I am well aware that your near neighbourhood will bring happiness to me, but, at the same time, I would have you clearly realise that I only relinquish the rare privilege of your undivided society throughout the evening for the sake of that harmony which I know you would desire.”
“Miss Norah,” urged Mr Purchase, “do not for one moment suppose that, in self-abnegation, Basil is one whit in front of me. What I suffer by acceding, for the sake of peace, to the compromise which has been suggested, it is possible that you will one day know.”
“It’s you only I’m thinking of, Miss Norah,” declared Mr Rumford. “I needn’t tell you which I’m likely to prefer, to have you all to myself—blissful thought, Miss Norah!—or to—to share you with a crowd.”
Mr Rumford looked about him in a way which certainly was not suggestive of the harmony of which they all were speaking. Major Tibbet joined himself to the chorus, with a simper which ill became him.
“You will judge what my feelings are, Miss Norah, when I tell you that, for your sake, I will consent to dine at seven. I have made it one of the rules of my life never to dine, anywhere, before eight. How long it is since I dined at the abnormal hour of seven, I am unable to say positively, without referring. But so far as my memory serves me—and in matters of such importance I think my memory may be trusted—I say, that so far as my memory serves me——”
“Yes, we know what you say, Tibbet; and you can say the rest to-night. Remember, Miss Norah, a quarter to seven—sharp!”
Mr Hammond thrust his arm through the Major’s and bore him away. The five men all left the room, and I was left alone with the girls and mamma.
CHAPTER XI.
THE TURNING OF THE WORM
No one spoke a word for quite a minute. The girls and mamma were looking at me—I was conscious of their eyes all over me—and I was looking at the floor. I felt as if I had been guilty of—to say the very least—the gravest impropriety, though I had not the faintest notion how, and was thoroughly well aware that now the storm was about to burst,—which presently it did. Mamma began—in that tone of voice in which she addresses observations to the servants which she dares them to deny. It gives you the impression that she is sitting on the safety-valve, and that in another half-second there will be a blow-up. And there generally is.
“Norah, may I ask you to tell me what is the meaning of the scene which I have just witnessed?”