He made a gesture of despair.
"It is incomprehensible."
"I am going to tell you about them—about the two utterly different men." She said nothing for a full minute. Then she went to the door and called Mrs. Bassett into the room. "Please tell Mr. Castoon I shall have to keep him waiting rather longer than I thought."
"Certainly, my Lady," Mrs. Bassett said. Later she told her husband that Mr. Castoon looked very black at the news. "He's not the kind to like being kept waiting," she explained.
"Princes of the Blood ought to be glad to wait for Lady Daphne," the tenant farmer cried.
"You learned somehow that Arthur was expelled from Harrow. It is true. He managed to get into Trinity but lasted only a term. Then came Sandhurst and a commission finally and black disgrace. Mr. Rudolph Castoon who is a friend of my eldest brother took pity on him and made him one of his secretaries—he's in Parliament you know—but even he couldn't do anything. Then a little while in Australia and failure there. The last thing he did was to enlist just before the war broke out. Colonel Langley was given the command of a London regiment and found Arthur under the name you knew."
"But you said he wasn't Private Smith," Trent broke in eagerly.
"You will see later what I mean. How did you meet him?"
Trent explained in a few words. But what confessions or boasts he had been betrayed into making he said nothing about.