The Quiet Gentleman

When the ladies presently withdrew, Martin also left the table, saying that he must not keep Miss Morville waiting. Theo, suggesting that his cousin might wish to be alone with Lord Ulverston, engaged himself to keep the Dowager tolerably well amused with a few rubbers of piquet. This good-natured scheme for the Earl’s relief was rendered abortive, however, by her having previously extorted a promise from the Viscount to join her presently for a game of whist. This was kept up for some time after the appearance of the tea-table, the Dowager declaring that she scarcely knew how to tear herself away from the cards. “Twenty minutes to eleven!” she said, consulting the clock on the mantelshelf. “I shall be worn-out with dissipation. In general, you must know, I do not care to play after ten o’clock: it does not suit me; but this evening I have so much enjoyed the rubbers that I am not conscious of the hour. You play a very creditable game, Ulverston. I am no flatterer, so you may believe me when I say that I have been very well entertained. My dear father was a notable cardplayer, and I believe I have inherited his aptitude. Dear me, it will be wonderful if I am asleep before midnight! I shall not wait for Miss Morville to return, for if they are engaged in dancing, or speculation, at Whissenhurst, you know, there is no saying when she and Martin will come back. We will go to prayers immediately.”

Before this programme could be enforced on the company, the door opened to admit the two absentees. Their early return was explained, composedly by Miss Morville, and with great discontent by Martin. They had arrived at Whissenhurst to find Sir Thomas indisposed; and although his lady apprehended no cause for serious anxiety, he had gone to bed with a sore throat and a feverish pulse, and she had sent a message to Dr. Malpas, desiring him to call at the Grange in the morning. Her fear was that Sir Thomas had contracted influenza; and in these circumstances Miss Morville had not thought it proper to remain after tea had been drunk.

“If only Marianne does not take it from him!” Martin exclaimed. “One would have thought he need not have chosen this moment of all others to be ill! He might have caught influenza last month, and welcome — and, to be sure, I don’t know why he could not have done so, when half the countryside was abed with it! But no! Nothing will do but for him to be ill just when we are to hold our ball! I shouldn’t be at all surprised if the Bolderwoods do not come! It is all of a piece!”

“Shabby fellow!” said Ulverston, looking amused. “But so it is always with these crusty old men! They delight in plaguing the rest of us!”

“Oh, well, as to that, I would not call him crusty!”Martin owned.

“Ah, now you are being over-generous, I feel!”

“Sir Thomas is a very respectable man,” pronounced the Dowager. “We will send to enquire at Whissenhurst tomorrow, and I have no doubt that we shall receive a comfortable account of him. He would be very sorry not to be able to come to Stanyon, I daresay.”

“What,” demanded the Viscount, a little later, when Gervase had borne him away to the library on the entrance floor of the Castle, “is the peculiar virtue of Sir Thomas, which makes his presence indispensable to the success of your ball?”

Gervase laughed. “A daughter!”

“A daughter! Very well! I don’t need to ask, Is she beautiful?”

“Very beautiful, very engaging!”

“What a shocking thing it would be, then, for Sir Thomas to cry off! I shall certainly remain with you for a long visit, Ger!”

“Nothing could please me more, but take care you don’t tread upon Martin’s corns!”

“How can you, after watching my conciliatory manners this night, think such an event possible? What is the matter with that halfling?”

“Indulgence!”

The Viscount stretched out his hand for the glass of wine Gervase had poured for him. “I see. And is he in love with Sir Thomas’s daughter?”

“Calf-love. He is ready to murder me for — ” Gervase stopped, his hand arrested in the act of pouring a second glass of wine. “For flirting with her,” he ended lightly.

The Viscount’s countenance was cherubic, but his eyes held a good deal of shrewdness. He said: “I perceive, of course, that he is ready to murder you, my Tulip. Tell me about the damaged bridge!”

“Oh, so you heard that, did you? I had thought you absorbed in the attractions of the Steyne!”

“Very sharp ears, dear boy!” apologized the Viscount.

“There is nothing to tell. The storm last night cracked one of the supports to a wooden bridge thrown over a stream here, and Martin neglected to warn me of it. He is jealous of me, you see, and I think he felt it would do me good to be ducked in muddy water.”

“But what a delightful young man!” commented the Viscount. “Were you ducked?”

“No, my cousin was with me, and had some apprehension that the bridge might not be safe. In justice to Martin, he had already given instructions that the bridge should be barred. A schoolboy trick: no more.”