"What price my glorious sister's broken heart?" bellowed Mr. Leo, truculently maudlin.
"Damaged goods half price," was Peckover's inaudible reply.
"Eh, you scallywag?" The big man advanced upon him threateningly. "Let me go into figures with your beautiful Lord Quorn. Once before a man played the fool with Lalage, and we got five thousand pounds out of his executors."
"Executors?" repeated Peckover, interested in spite of more urgent considerations. "Poor fellow died then?"
"Yes, you see Carnaby called upon him," Lalage explained sweetly.
"Now," proceeded Mr. Leo, always with unnecessary volume of tone, "before I proceed to extremities, I should like to know from you, as his lordship's friend, how we stand."
It occurred to Peckover that the chances were that either he or both would stand on two stumps before long if the weather did not change. "Name your own sum for the return ticket," he said desperately.
Mr. Leo walked up and placed his hands upon Peckover's shoulders with such energy that the smaller man wondered he did not collapse into his boots. "Does he mean it?" he cried, glaring tipsily into Peckover's contorted face. "Not he! Look at his eye; it's shifty."
The victim considered he might esteem himself lucky if the feature in question did not shift out of his head forthwith.
"We must take time," said Lalage, laying a repressing hand on her brother's arm.