When at last he returned to retrieve his top-hat and to take his leave, he was jubilant. In the past he had been diffident; but gradually his confidence in himself and his new powers had grown, until now he was triumphantly sure of himself. Nothing, he felt, could stand in the way of such a man as he had shown himself to be. Immense riches, in themselves, need lead a man nowhere; but immense riches combined with social success—who could resist them? He had been accepted by these people as an equal and a friend; from that to being accepted by Isobel as a lover seemed to his excited brain only a step.
In the veranda stood Isobel herself, talking to her father and another man. With a slight throb of misgiving Alf recognized Lieutenant Allen. In his usual diffident frame of mind, he would have avoided an unnecessary meeting with his old platoon-commander; but now, intoxicated as he was by success, he greeted a spice of risk. He approached the group. Both Isobel and Allen looked excited—Alf had never seen his lady look so desirable, or felt her so approachable.
"'Ow do, Allen?" he said with such an air of jaunty familiarity that the others stared at him in sheer surprise. "Pleased to see you again, I'm sure. Well, I ought to be toddlin' off. Never 'ad such a time since I don't know when. But you'll be sure an' bring Miss Is—Miss FitzPeter round an' 'ave a bit o' something to eat an' a look round the 'ouse, won't you, sir? 'Ow about to-morrow?"
Sir Edward, still overflowing with loving kindness towards his neighbor, and having decided that, come what might, he must keep the bowls, beamed on him.
"Don't go, Mr. Wentworth," he said.
His daughter looked up sharply and shook her head; Mr. Wentworth was all very well in his way, but she wanted him on her hands no longer, now that Denis had returned. But her father did not notice her little pantomime and blundered genially on.
"Those boys have monopolized you so that I've seen nothing of you. Stay to dinner, won't you, and afterward—if you'd be so kind—I'll get your expert opinion on a small article I'm writing on Eastern dress and architecture."
In his joy at the first part of this invitation, Alf hardly listened to the second; but his sense of propriety intervened for a moment.
"But I didn't ought ... these clothes...." he began.
"Oh, never mind. You'll do splendidly as you are, eh, Iso?"