Gage did accordingly ask him.
"Mind your own business," was the unsatisfactory answer. "If you are Lord Quorn nobody else can be. But it would be interesting to know how you came into the title."
"What the deuce does it matter," Peckover protested. "That conundrum will keep. That little devil will be back here directly. What we've got to talk about is how we are going to tackle him."
The suggestion was so profoundly to the point that a depressing silence fell on the trio. They all three jumped when Bisgood came in softly to announce that dinner had been ready half-an-hour.
"Dinner?" cried Gage. "No dinner for me. I'm off."
"Don't be silly," Peckover remonstrated. "We'll have our dinner first. A bottle of champagne is the stuff to bring us into condition. Come on, Jenkins, old man. You're dining with us to-night."
An exacting afternoon had left the trio in a state so low that sustenance was imperative, wherefore they went gloomily in to dinner. The meal was taken hurriedly, and, with regard to the wine, copiously. So by degrees they began to feel in a less abject state of panic.
"Why did we let that fool of a detective talk himself off the premises?" said Peckover regretfully. "Anyhow, we had better have the local man up here in case that nuisance of a duke tries his 'Come into the garden, Maud,' again with us."
"What good will that chaw in uniform be against that little devil?" objected Gage drearily.
"He's somebody," urged Peckover. "And he's got the law behind him."