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Page 3
"Can't coerce a girl."
"I never suggested that you should coerce her, as you put it. I
merely meant that you could point out to her, as a father, where
her duty and happiness lie."
"Drink this!" cried his lordship with sudden fury, spraying his can
over the nearest bush, and addressing his remark to the invisible
thrips. He had forgotten Lady Caroline completely. "Don't stint
yourselves! There's lots more!"
A girl came down the steps of the castle and made her way towards
them. She was a good-looking girl, with an air of quiet efficiency
about her. Her eyes were grey and whimsical. Her head was
uncovered, and the breeze stirred her dark hair. She made a
graceful picture in the morning sunshine, and Reggie Byng, sighting
her from the terrace, wobbled in his tracks, turned pink, and lost
the thread of his remarks.
The sudden appearance of Alice Faraday always affected him like
that.
"I have copied out the notes you made last night, Lord
Marshmoreton. I typed two copies."
Alice Faraday spoke in a quiet, respectful, yet subtly
authoritative voice. She was a girl of great character. Previous
employers of her services as secretary had found her a jewel. To
Lord Marshmoreton she was rapidly becoming a perfect incubus. Their
views on the relative importance of gardening and family histories
did not coincide. To him the history of the Marshmoreton family was
the occupation of the idle hour: she seemed to think that he ought
to regard it as a life-work. She was always coming and digging him
out of the garden and dragging him back to what should have been a
purely after-dinner task. It was Lord Marshmoreton's habit, when
he awoke after one of his naps too late to resume work, to throw
out some vague promise of "attending to it tomorrow"; but, he
reflected bitterly, the girl ought to have tact and sense to
understand that this was only polite persiflage, and not to be
taken literally.
"They are very rough," continued Alice, addressing her conversation
to the seat of his lordship's corduroy trousers. Lord Marshmoreton
always assumed a stooping attitude when he saw Miss Faraday
approaching with papers in her hand; for he laboured under a
pathetic delusion, of which no amount of failures could rid him,
that if she did not see his face she would withdraw. "You remember
last night you promised you would attend to them this morning." She
paused long enough to receive a non-committal grunt by way of
answer. "Of course, if you're busy--" she said placidly, with a
half-glance at Lady Caroline. That masterful woman could always be
counted on as an ally in these little encounters.
"Nothing of the kind!" said Lady Caroline crisply. She was still
ruffled by the lack of attention which her recent utterances had
received, and welcomed the chance of administering discipline. "Get
up at once, John, and go in and work."
"I am working," pleaded Lord Marshmoreton.
Despite his forty-eight years his sister Caroline still had the
power at times to make him feel like a small boy. She had been a
great martinet in the days of their mutual nursery.
"The Family History is more important than grubbing about in the
dirt. I cannot understand why you do not leave this sort of thing
to MacPherson. Why you should pay him liberal wages and then do his
work for him, I cannot see. You know the publishers are waiting for
the History. Go and attend to these notes at once."
"You promised you would attend to them this morning, Lord
Marshmoreton," said Alice invitingly.
Lord Marshmoreton clung to his can of whale-oil solution with the
clutch of a drowning man. None knew better than he that these
interviews, especially when Caroline was present to lend the weight
of her dominating personality, always ended in the same way.
"Yes, yes, yes!" he said. "Tonight, perhaps. After dinner, eh? Yes,
after dinner. That will be capital."
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