I threw away my cigarette and made for the door.
"In the words of my tutor, the estimable Mr. Templeton," I said, "Thees ees erl vary irraygular, Meester O'Reene. I think I shall go and tell Lady Loring, Sonia, and leave her to break it to your parents."
Sonia clasped her hands in supplication.
"Dear George, don't be mean! It's an absolute secret!"
"You can tell it to the Devil himself for all I care!" cried O'Rane in defiance.
The only person to whom, in fact, I told the news was Amy Loring.
"But how absurd!" she exclaimed. "Sonia's only a child. He's not much more than a boy himself."
"Time will work wonders," I said.
"But will he have anything to marry on?"
"He's never had a shilling to call his own since he was thirteen and a half. It's just the sort of thing he would do."