Grantham, who had been unusually silent throughout the service of
dinner, slipped away from the room a few minutes before the other men.
He found Letitia arranging a bridge table, and drew her a little on one
side.
"Letitia," he said, "I am annoyed."
"My dear Charles," she replied, "was anything ever more obvious!"
"You perhaps do not realise," he continued, "that you are the cause."
She shrugged her shoulders.
"Well?"
"In the first place," he complained, "you are not wearing my ring."
"I thought I told you," she reminded him, "that I would prefer not to
until we formally announced our engagement."
"Why on earth shouldn't we do that at once--this evening?" he
suggested. "I can see no reason for delay."
"I, on the other hand, have a fancy to wait," she replied carelessly,
"at least until your visit here is over.
"Your hesitation is scarcely flattering," he remarked with some
irritation.
"Is there anything else you wish to say?" she enquired. "I really must
get out those bridge markers."
He began to show signs of temper. Watching him closely for the first
time, Letitia decided that he had most unpleasant-looking eyes.
"I should like to know the subject of your conversation with that Thain
fellow when I came in this evening," he demanded.
"I am sorry," she said coolly. "We were speaking upon a private
subject."
The anger in his eyes became more evident.
"Private subject? You mean to say that you have secrets with a fellow
like that?"
"A fellow like that?" she repeated. "You don't like Mr. Thain, then?"
"Like him? I don't like him or dislike him. I think he ought to be
very flattered to be here at all--and you are the last person in the
world, Letitia, I should have expected to find talking in whispers with
him, with your heads only a few inches apart. I feel quite justified
in asking what that confidence indicated."
Letitia smiled sweetly but dangerously.
"And I feel quite justified," she retorted, "in refusing to answer that
or any similar question. Are you going to play bridge, Charlie?"
"No!" he replied, turning away. "I am going to talk to Miss Laycey."
Sylvia was quite willing, and they soon established themselves on a
settee. The Duchess, rather against her inclinations, was included in
the bridge quartette. Letitia, having disposed of her guests, strolled
over towards David, who was standing with his hands behind him,
gloomily studying one of the paintings.
"I must show you our Vandykes, Mr. Thain," she said, leading him a
little further away. "When these wonderful oil shares of yours have
made us all rich, we shall have little electric globes round our old
masters. Until then, I find it produces quite a curious effect to try
one of these."
She drew an electric torch from one of the drawers of an oak cabinet
and flashed a small circle of light upon the picture. Thain gave a
little exclamation. The face which seemed to spring suddenly into
life, looking down upon them with a faintly repressed smile upon the
Mandeleys mouth, presented an almost startling likeness to the Marquis.
"Fearfully alike, all our menkind, aren't they?" she observed, lowering
the torch. "Come and I will show you a Lely."
They passed further down the gallery. She looked at him a little
curiously.
"Is it my fancy," she asked, "or have you something on your mind? The
note which reached you contained no ill news, I hope?"
"I don't know," he answered, with unexpected candour. "I have a great
deal on my mind."
"I am so sorry," she murmured.
They had reached the further end of the gallery now. She sank into the
window seat and made room for him by her side. For a moment he looked
out across the park. In the moonless night the trees were like little
dark blurs, the country rose and fell like a turbulent sea. And very
close at hand, ominously close at hand as it seemed to him, a bright
light from Richard Vont's cottage was burning steadily.
"Let me ask you a question," he begged a little abruptly. "Supposing
that you had given your word of honour, solemnly, in return for a vital
service rendered, to commit a dishonourable action; what should you do?"
"Well, that is rather a dilemma, isn't it?" she acknowledged. "To tell
you the truth, I can't quite reconcile the circumstances. I can't, for
instance, conceive your promising to do a dishonourable thing."
"At the time," he explained, "it did not seem dishonourable. At the
time it seemed just an act of justice. Then circumstances changed, new
considerations intervened, and the whole situation was altered."
"Is it a monetary matter?" she enquired, "one in which money would make
any difference, I mean?"
He shook his head.
"Money has nothing to do with it," he replied. "It is just a question
whether one is justified in breaking a solemn oath, one's word of
honour, because the action which it entails has become, owing to later
circumstances, hideously repugnant."
"Why ask my advice?"
"I do not know. Anyhow, I desire it."
"I should go," she said thoughtfully, "to the person to whom I had
bound myself, and I should explain the change in my feelings and in the
circumstances. I should beg to be released from my word."
"And if they refused?"
"I don't see how you could possibly break your word of honour," she
decided reluctantly. "It is not done, is it?"
He looked steadily down the gallery, through the darkened portion, to
where the soft, overhead lights fell upon the two card tables. There
was very little conversation. They could even hear the soft fall of
the cards and Sylvia's musical laugh in the background. All the time
Letitia watched him. The strength of his face seemed only intensified
by his angry indecision.
"You are right," he assented finally. "I must not."
"Perhaps," she suggested, "you can find some way of keeping it, and yet
keeping it without that secondary dishonour you spoke of. Now I must
really go and see that my guests are behaving properly."
She rose to her feet. Sylvia's laugh rang out again from the far
corner of the gallery, where she and Grantham were seated, their heads
very close together. Letitia watched them for a moment tolerantly.
"I will recall my fiance to his duty," she declared, "and you can go
and talk nonsense to Sylvia."
"Thank you," he answered, "I am afraid that I am not in the humour to
talk nonsense with anybody."
She turned her head slightly and looked at him.
"Sylvia is such an admirer of yours," she said, "and she has such a
delightful way of being light-hearted herself and affecting others in
the same fashion. If I were a man--"
"Yes?"
"I should marry Sylvia."
"And if I," he declared, with a sudden flash in his eyes, "possessed
that ridiculous family tree of Lord Charles Grantham's--"
"Well?"
"I should marry you."
She looked at him through half-closed eyes. There was a little smile
on her lips which at first he thought insolent, but concerning which
afterwards he permitted himself to speculate. He stopped short.
"Lady Letitia," he pleaded, "there is a door there which leads into the
hall. You don't expect manners of me, anyway, but could you accept my
farewell and excuse me to the others? I have really a serious reason
for wishing to leave--a reason connected with the note I received at
dinner time."
"Of course," she answered, "but you are sure that you are well? There
is nothing that we can do for you?"
He paused for a moment with his hand upon the fastening of the door.
"There is nothing anybody can do for me, Lady Letitia," he said.
"Good-by!"
She stood for a moment, watching the door through which he had passed
with a puzzled frown upon her face. Then she continued her progress
down the room. Arrived at the bridge table, she stooped for a moment
to look over her aunt's score.
"Finished your flirtation, my dear?" the latter asked coolly.
Letitia accepted the challenge.
"So effectually," she replied, "that the poor man has gone home. I am
to present his excuses to every one."
The Duchess paused for a moment in the playing of her hand. Her
brother, with unfailing tact, threw himself into the breach.
"I suppose," he said, "that we can scarcely realise the
responsibilities which these kings of finance carry always upon their
shoulders. They tell me that Mr. Thain has his telegrams and cables
stopped in London by a secretary and telephoned here, just to save a
few minutes. He receives sometimes as many as half a dozen messages
during the night."
The Duchess continued to play her hand.
"After all," she remarked, "I fear that I shall not be able to ask Mr.
Thain to Scotland. One would feel the responsibility so much if he
were to lose anything he valued, by coming."