His lordship, as the principal personage in social rank, shall be reported first. He said: “More than a week has passed, Romayne, and we have neither seen you nor heard from you. Why have you neglected us?”
Here, judging by certain sounds that followed, Penrose got up discreetly, and left the room. Lord Loring went on.
He said to Romayne: “Now we are alone, I may speak to you more freely. You and Stella seemed to get on together admirably that evening when you dined with us. Have you forgotten what you told me of her influence over you? Or have you altered your opinion—and is that the reason why you keep away from us?”
Romayne answered: “My opinion remains unchanged. All that I said to you of Miss Eyrecourt, I believe as firmly as ever.”
His lordship remonstrated, naturally enough. “Then why remain away from the good influence? Why—if it really can be controlled—risk another return of that dreadful nervous delusion?”
“I have had another return.”
“Which, as you yourself believe, might have been prevented! Romayne, you astonish me.”
There was a time of silence, before Romayne answered this. He was a little mysterious when he did reply. “You know the old saying, my good friend—of two evils, choose the least. I bear my sufferings as one of two evils, and the least of the two.”
Lord Loring appeared to feel the necessity of touching a delicate subject with a light hand. He said, in his pleasant way: “Stella isn’t the other evil, I suppose?”
“Most assuredly not.”