"Mr. Gage. Not one of the Shropshire Gages?"
"Not that I know of," he replied, beating down a sporting instinct to claim kindred with that highly respectable, if rural, family.
"Ah! Some of the Worcestershire branch, the Lovel-Gages, were my greatest friends," said Lady Ormstork regretfully reminiscent. "You don't come from Worcestershire?"
"Not straight," he answered.
Lady Ormstork laughed, as she always did when there was the possibility of a joke being intended. "Well my dear Mr. Gage, I may tell you in confidence, as I feel we are going to be very good friends, that one of the reasons I brought dear Ulrica down to this quiet place was to be out of the way of certain fortune hunters who were pursuing her with their attentions."
"I don't wonder," responded Peckover, with a touch of enthusiasm.
"No," the lady agreed. "Apart from her immense fortune, she is adorable. So handsome! and so clever!"
"Yes, she's all that," said Peckover, enviously thinking of what a good time his friend was having, and regretting for once, that he had let the title go.
"One person in particular," pursued the dowager, "has given me great anxiety. A Spanish duke, of undeniable family, a Grandee of Spain, and all that sort of thing, don't you know, but very poor, and consequently most persistent. You know what these foreigners are."
"Rather," Peckover assured her, in a tone which implied an intimate acquaintance with the procedure of Spanish Grandees, rich and poor.