"Ask him to see me down here, please. Say a gentleman." He stepped to a mirror as he spoke and carefully twisted the ends of his blond moustache.
"Very good, sir," said the servant.
Major Colquhoun walked into the library in the same deliberate way, and turned up the gas. Mr. Frayling came hurrying down, fat and fussy, and puffing a little, but cheerfully rubicund upon the success of the day's proceedings, and apprehending nothing untoward. When he saw his son-in-law he opened his eyes, stopped short, turned pale, and gasped.
"Is Evadne here?" Major Colquhoun asked quietly.
"Here? No! What should she be doing here? What has happened?" Mr. Frayling exclaimed aghast.
"That is just what I don't rightly know myself if she is not here," Major Colquhoun replied, the quiet demeanour he had assumed contrasting favourably with his father-in-law's fuss and fume.
"Why have you left her? What are you doing here? Explain," Mr. Frayling demanded almost angrily.
Major Colquhoun related the little he knew, and Mr. Frayling plumped down into a chair to listen, and bounced up again, when all was said, to speak.
"Let me send for her mother," he began, showing at once where, in an emergency, he felt that his strength lay. "No, though, I'd better go myself and prepare her," he added on second thought. "We mustn't make a fuss—with all the servants about too. They would talk." And then he fussed off himself, with agitation evident in every step.
Something like a smile disturbed Major Colquhoun's calm countenance for a moment, and then he stood, twisting the ends of his fair moustache slowly with his left hand, and gazing into the fire, which shone reflected in his steely blue eyes, making them glitter like pale sapphires, coldly, while he waited.