"I'm sure I'm very sorry, my lord," the discomfited Popkiss apologized. "But as this gentleman did not deny it when I addressed him as my lord, and as we were expecting your lordship to honour my poor house, why, the mistake was only natural."
"That's all right," replied Gage.
"You're forgiven," grinned Peckover.
Wheels sounded under the archway of the courtyard, and Popkiss was glad to bustle out. "I had my doubts about him all the time," he told himself in extenuation of his error. "If I'd seen them both together at first I should ha' known at once that 'tother was the lord."
Meanwhile the two confederates were laughing at each other over the success of the first step on the path that promised to be so pleasant for both.
They composed their faces as the door was thrown open and Colonel Hemyock and the Misses Ethel and Dagmar Hemyock, accompanied by John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook, were ushered in with breathless ceremony by the egregious Popkiss.
"Lord Quorn?" the Colonel inquired in a tone of pompous cordiality.
Popkiss unctuously indicated Gage, who came forward with plausible aplomb.
Then the ladies were presented, and Sharnbrook noticed gleefully the dead-set that lurked in their eyes. His escape, he told himself, was now assured.
"May I present my friend, Mr. Percival Gage?" the supposititious Lord Quorn said, as, taking the permission for granted, he brought up Peckover, whom, however, the Hemyock trio regarded a trifle doubtfully. "Made a fine position for himself out in our part of the world," Gage continued half confidentially, "and has come over to the old country to enjoy the fruits of his good fortune."