'And I,' said Artemisia, 'I also want to know who and what manner of person I have married.'
'That, perhaps, I can tell you,' said Philip gravely. 'But not in the presence of these ladies. Mr. Schofield, or whatever you call yourself, I will trouble you to return to your table, or reseat yourself where you were. I see the waitress is in alarm lest she should lose payment for what you ordered and have consumed.'
Beaple Yeo sulkily went back to his place. Philip with a sign, showed Artemisia that he desired her to follow. She obeyed. When they were beyond earshot of Mrs. Sidebottom, Salome, and the rest, Philip said, standing by the little table, 'Mr. Schofield, I also wish to ask of you a question.'
'I am ready, my dear boy, to be put through my catechism,' answered Yeo, with recovered assurance. 'If you want the pedigree of Schofield, I have it at my fingers' ends.'
'It is not the pedigree so much as the alliances of Earle Schofield that interest me,' said Philip.
'Oh, the Schofields have been allied with the best blood in the land, better than your twopenny-ha'penny manufacturers.'
'I must ask you to tell me whether, before you married Miss Durham at the Embassy to-day, you had ascertained that an alliance—not a very high one—was at an end.'
'What do you mean?' asked Yeo, with his face slightly changing colour.
'You may happen to remember Ann Dewis, the coal-barge woman, whom you married at Hull some sixteen years ago?'
Beaple uttered a low oath.