Reggie laughed.
“Don’t be an ass, Frank; you might help me. You don’t know how utterly rotten it is to have a mother like mine who wants to keep me tied to her apron-strings. She makes me tell her everything I do, and of course I have to fake up some yarn. The only thing in it is that she’ll swallow any damned lie I tell her.”
“You can tell her lies till you’re blue in the face,” said Frank, “but I don’t see why the devil I should.”
“Don’t be a beast, Frank. You might help me just this once. It won’t hurt you to say I’m grubbing with you. The other night, by Jove! I nearly gave the show away. You know she always waits up for me. I told her I should be working late with my crammer, and went to the Empire. Well, I met a lot of chaps there and got a bit squiffy. There would have been a shindy if she’d noticed it, but I managed to pull myself together a bit, and said I’d got the very deuce of a headache. And next day I heard her tell someone that I was next door to a teetotaler.”
They reached the drawing-room and Frank found himself close to Mrs. Bassett.
“Oh, Dr. Hurrell,” she said, “I want to thank you so much for asking Reggie to dinner on Saturday. He’s been working so hard that I think a little relaxation will do him good. And his tutor keeps him sometimes till past eleven—it can’t be good for him, can it? The night before last he was so tired when he came in that he could scarcely get up the stairs.”
“I’m delighted that Reggie should care to come and dine with me sometimes,” answered Frank, somewhat grimly.
“I’m always glad to think he’s with you. It’s so important that a young man should have really trustworthy friends, and I feel sure your influence is good for him.”
Reggie, listening to this, gave Frank a very slow and significant wink, then went off with a light heart to resume his conversation with Mrs. Castillyon.