"That was not all. Papa promised to give him a very good position. He had intended to offer money. But I explained to him that, of course, Tom would not accept money."
"Very true. I doubt if he would have accepted it even had it not been for his hope that—" Lord James paused and stared glumly at his finger-tips. "Bally mess, deuce take it! He and your father at outs, and he and I—"
"You have not quarrelled? You're still friends?" exclaimed Genevieve.
"Quarrelled? No, I assure you, no! Yet am I his friend? Permit me to be candid, Miss Leslie. I'm in a deuce of a quandary. On the trip up to Aden, you'll remember, I told you something of the way he and I had knocked about together."
"Yes. Frankly, it added not a little to my esteem for you that you had learned to value his sterling worth."
"I did not tell you how it started. It was in the Kootenay country—British Columbia, you know. Bunch of sharpers set about to rook me on a frame-up—a bunco game. Tom tipped me off, though I had snubbed him, like the egregious ass I was. I paid no heed; blundered into the trap. Wouldn't have minded losing the thousand pounds they wanted, but they brought a woman into the affair—made it appear as if I were a cad—or worse."
"Surely not that, Lord James. No one could believe that of you."
"You don't know the beastly cleverness of those bunco chaps. They had me in a nasty hole, when Tom stepped in and showed them up. Seems he knew more about the woman and two of the men than they cared to have published. They decamped."
"That was so like Tom!" murmured Genevieve.
"Claimed he did it because of an old grudge against the parties. Had to force my thanks on him. Told you how we'd chummed together since. Deuce take it! why should it have been you on that steamer—with him?"