‘Not privileged.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I went out of your garden by the back gate, and followed her carriage to the railway. He simply went to the first bridge outside the station, and waited. When she was in the train, it moved forward; he was all expectation, and drew out his handkerchief ready to wave, while she looked out of the window towards the bridge. The train backed before it reached the bridge, to attach the box containing her horses, and the carriage-truck. Then it started for good, and when it reached the bridge she looked out again, he waving his handkerchief to her.’
‘And she waving hers back?’
‘No, she didn’t.’
‘Ah!’
‘She looked at him—nothing more. I wouldn’t give much for his chance.’ After a while Dare added musingly: ‘You are a mathematician: did you ever investigate the doctrine of expectations?’
‘Never.’
Dare drew from his pocket his ‘Book of Chances,’ a volume as well thumbed as the minister’s Bible. ‘This is a treatise on the subject,’ he said. ‘I will teach it to you some day.’
The same evening Havill asked Dare to dine with him. He was just at this time living en garcon, his wife and children being away on a visit. After dinner they sat on till their faces were rather flushed. The talk turned, as before, on the castle-competition.