"Can't I?" said Lord Shortlands, thrusting his thumbs deeper into the armholes of his waistcoat and waggling his fingers. "Watch me!"
It seemed to Lady Adela, for it was evident that nothing was to be gained by arguing with this unbridled man, that the only course open to her was to fly to Mrs. Punter, whom she had always found a reasonable woman, and appeal to her sense of what was fitting. She proceeded to put this plan into action with such promptness that she was gone before Lord Shortlands realized that she had started. One quick leap, a whizzing sound, and she had vanished. And a moment later Augustus Robb re-entered, wearing the unmistakable air of a man who has had his ear to the keyhole.
"Coo, m'lord," said Augustus Robb admiringly. "That was telling her!"
"Ha!" said Lord Shortlands, still very much above himself. He strode masterfully about the room, waggling his fingers.
"And I've got something to tell you, chum," said Augustus Robb. "It's like this."
He broke off, for Mike and Terry had come in. Terry seemed a little agitated, and Mike was patting her hand.
"Your daughter Teresa," he said, "has been suffering a good deal of filial agony on your behalf, my dear Shorty. She was offering me eight to one that we should find you chewed into fragments, and I must say I was anticipating that I should have to dig down for the price of a wreath and a bunch of lilies. But at a hasty glance you appear to be still in one piece."
Lord Shortlands said that he was quite all right, never better, and Augustus Robb endorsed the statement.
"He put it all over her. Ticked her off, he did. Proper."
Terry was amazed.
"Shorty! Did you?"
"Certainly," said Lord Shortlands, and if there was in his manner a touch of pomposity, this was only to be expected after so notable a victory. Wellington was probably a little pompous after Waterloo. "I have been too lenient with Adela in the past, far too lenient, and she has taken advantage of my good nature. It was high time that I asserted myself. As Mr. Robb so nghtly says, I—ah—ticked her off proper. She's gone away with a flea in her ear, I can assure you. Ha! You should have seen her face when I said I was going to marry Alice Punter."
The man was lost to all shame.
"You said that?"
"Certainly."
"To Adela?"
"You betcher. 'Oh, and by the way,' I said. 'I'm going to marry Mrs. Punter.'"
"But you ain't, chum," said Augustus Robb mildly. "That's what I was starting to tell you."
"Eh?" Lord Shortlands glared formidably. He was under an obligation to this buster of petes, but gratitude was not going to make him put up with this sort of thing. "Who says so?"
Augustus Robb removed his horn-rimmed spectacles, gave them a polish and replaced them.
"Well, I do, cocky, for one, and she does, for another. Because the 'ole thing is, you see, she's going to marry me."
"What!"
"Yus. It's a long story," said Augustus Robb. "I was telling Mr. Cardinal and his little bit about it last night. We ought to have got married years ago, only she inadvertently went and waited for me at the Meek Street registry office when I was waiting for 'er at the Beak Street registry office. Shouldn't wonder if that sort of thing didn't often occur."
Terry gasped.
"Then—"
"Yus, ducky. She's the woman I loved and lorst. You could have knocked me down with a feather," said Augustus Robb. "I come out of that library after getting that there stamp, and I was doing a quiet shift-ho to my room to hide the blinking thing, when I see someone coming along the passage, and it was 'Er!"
"Good heavens!"
"You may well say 'Good heavens!', ducky. It was a fair staggerer. 'Alice!' I says, knocked all of a heap. 'Gus!' she says, pressing of a 'and to 'er 'eart. 'Is it you?' I says. 'Yus, it is,' she says, 'and you're a nice cup of tea, you are,' she says. 'What 'ave you got to say for yourself?' she says. Whereupon explanations ensued, as the expression is, and the upshot of it all is that we're off to Beak Street registry office next week—together, this time."
"You'll probably find us in the waiting room," said Mike. "My heartiest congratulations, Augustus."
"Thanks, cocky."
"If there's one thing I like, it is to see two loving hearts come together after long separation, particularly in springtime. But have you considered one rather important point? Mrs. Punter's ideals are pretty high. The man who wins her must have two hundred pounds to buy a pub."
"I've got it, and more."
"Been robbing a bank?"
"No, I 'ave not been robbing a bank. But there's a little bit of money coming to me from a source I'm not at liberty to mention. I could buy 'er 'arf a dozen pubs."
A faint groan greeted this statement. It proceeded from Lord Shortlands, who at the beginning of the recital had sunk into a chair and was lying in it in that curious boneless manner which he affected in moments of keen emotion. Terry looked at him remorsefully. Augustus Robb's human-interest story had caused her to forget that what was jam for him was gall and wormwood to a loved father.
"Oh, Shorty, darling!" she cried. "I wasn't thinking of you."
"It's all right," said Mike. "He still has us."
"Yes, Shorty, you still have us."
"And the stamp," said Mike.
Lord Shortlands stirred. He half rose in his chair like a corpse preparing to step out of the coffin. He had forgotten the stamp. Reminded of it, he showed signs of perking up a little.
"Gimme," he said feebly.
"Give him the stamp, Augustus," said Mike.
Something in the trend events had taken seemed to be embarrassing Augustus Robb. He shifted from one foot to the other, looking coy.
"Now, there's something I was intending to touch on," he said. "Yus, I was going to mention that. I'm sorry to tell you, chums, that there's been a somewhat regrettable occurrence. You see, when I come out of that liberry, I put that there stamp in me mouth, to keep it safe like, and what with the excitement and what I might call agitation of meeting 'Er, I—"
"What?" cried Lord Shortlands, for the speaker had paused. He had risen completely from his chair now, and was pawing the air feverishly. "What?"
"I swallered it, cocky," said Augustus Robb, and Lord Shortlands' blood pressure leaped to a new high as if somebody had cried "Hoop-la!" to it. "Last thing I'd 'ave wanted to 'ave 'appen, but there you are. That's Life, that's what that is. Well, good-bye, all," said Augustus Robb, and was gone. Lady Adela herself had not moved quicker.
The first of a stunned trio to comment on the situation was Lord Shortlands.
"It's a ramp!" he shouted passionately. "It's a swindle! I don't believe a word of it. He's gone off with the thing in his pocket."
Mike nodded sympathetically. The same thought had occurred to him.
"I fear so, Shorty. One should have reflected, before enlisting Augustus's services, that he is a man of infinite guile. One begins to see now why he spoke so loftily about having enough money to buy half a dozen pubs."
"I'll sue him! I'll fight the case to the House of Lords!"
"H'm," said Mike. And Lord Shortlands, on reflection, said "H'm" too.
A moment later he was uttering a cry so loud and agonized that Terry leaped like a jumping bean, and even Mike was disconcerted. The fifth earl was staring before him with bulging eyes. He reminded Mike of a butler discovering beetles in his glass of port.
"What the devil am I to do?" he wailed, writhing visibly. "I've gone and told Adela about Mrs. Punter!"
"So you have!" said Mike. "If I may borrow Augustus's favorite expression, Coo! But have no alarm—"
"She'll make my life a hell! I'll never have another peaceful moment. My every movement will be watched for the rest of my life. Why, dash it, it'll be like being a prisoner in a bally chain gang."