The promise was faithfully kept, since it seemed expedient to both men to avoid their friends from The Cracknels, at any rate till they saw how their Castilian rival was going to be disposed of.
"They are bound to come up this afternoon as usual," Gage observed to his friend.
"With that Spanish terror after them, shouldn't wonder," said Peckover. "We're best out of the way."
"Ethel and Dagmar will be poor fun after Ulrica," Gage remarked gloomily.
"Tell you what it is, my friend," said Peckover. "The sooner you bring yourself to consider Ulrica a thing of the past the better chance you'll have of making old bones. Ethel and Dagmar may not be all our fancy painted, but at least they haven't got a blood-thirsty Spanish nob hanging about them with traditions and a nasty way of talking polite flummery with a revolver playfully pointed at the vital parts of your anatomy all the time. You won't have a ducal freak poking his long nose in there."
"Well, we had better go down, have a fling with the second quality beauties and then clear out of the place till things cool down," said Gage with the air of a man who has made up his mind.
Accordingly, after an early luncheon, they went down to the Moat, and flirted so recklessly with the not unduly obdurate young ladies, that Lady Agatha was induced to dismiss from her mind a grand plan she had been formulating for the recapture of John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook, and even went so far as to canvass the respective claims of pink and apple-green in connexion with the general scheme of colour for a double bevy of bridesmaids.
It was late, as late for safety as they could make it, when Gage and Peckover returned home, discussing plans for a sudden flight next morning.
"Lady Ormstork called?" Gage asked Bisgood carelessly, as he turned into the smoking-room for a cigarette before going up to dress.
"Yes, my lord. And Miss Buffkin."