Lady Adela now decided to begin the cosy chat. She accordingly discharged what is known on rifle-ranges as a sighting shot.

"By the way, dear Constance, have you and your husband seen much of d.i.c.k lately?"

"Oh, we meet him about occasionally," replied Connie, casting about for cover--"at parties, and so on."

"I fear," continued Lady Adela, with what the police call "intent,"

"that the poor boy is lonely."

"The last time I saw him," replied Connie, "he was entertaining five people to luncheon at the Trocadero. He did n't _look_ lonely."

"There is a loneliness of spirit, dear," replied Lady Adela gently, "of which some of us know nothing. I think it shows that d.i.c.k _must_ be feeling lonely if he requires no less than five people to cheer him up."

"I am sure you are right," said the obliging Mrs. Carmyle.

"Was Norah Puncheon of the party, by any chance?" enquired Lady Adela carelessly.

"No. I did n't know any of the people. Is Norah a friend of d.i.c.ky's?"

"They have seen a good deal of one another of late, I believe," replied the diplomatic Lady Adela, much as a motorist with his radiator full of feathers might admit having recently noticed a hen somewhere.

"Constance dear," she continued, coming in her maternal solicitude quite prematurely to the point, "you are always so discreet. It is high time d.i.c.k was married, and this time I really do think--no, I _feel_ it instinctively--that Norah Puncheon is the right woman for him."

"The right woman!" replied the late First Reserve pensively. "How awful that always sounds! The wrong one is always so much nicer!"

"My dear," exclaimed the horrified Lady Adela, "whoever put such a notion into your head?"

"d.i.c.ky. He told me so himself."

"Has Norah Puncheon much influence over him, do you know?" continued Lady Adela, falling back on to safer ground.

"Yes, lots," replied Connie, stifling the tiniest of yawns. "There goes your telephone."

"Milroy will attend to it, dear. Let me see," pursued Lady Adela, with studious vagueness--"what were we talking about?"

"Norah Puncheon's influence over d.i.c.ky," replied Connie, popping a lump of sugar into her mouth and crunching it with all the satisfaction of a child of six.

"You have noticed it yourself, then?"

Connie, quite speechless, nodded.

Lady Adela beamed. The scent was growing stronger.

"In what way, dear?" she asked, with unfeigned interest.

"Well," said Connie, after an interval of profound reflection, "d.i.c.ky wanted to back Prince Caramel for the St. Leger, and Norah would n't let him. He was so grateful to her afterwards!"

Lady Adela summoned up a lopsided smile--the smile of a tarpon-fisher who has pulled up a red herring.

"I think her influence goes deeper than that, dearest," she rejoined in patient reproof. "You, who only knew my son as a rather careless and light-hearted boy, would hardly credit--"

"A telephone message, my lady!" announced Milroy, appearing at the dining-room door.

Lady Adela, tripped up on her way to a striking pa.s.sage, sighed with an air of pathetic endurance, and enquired:--

"From whom, Milroy?"

"From Mr. Richard, my lady."

"Mr. Richard? Where is he?"

"He has telephoned from Shotley Post-Office, my lady," replied Milroy, keenly appreciating the mild sensation he was about to create; "to say that he has arrived by the four-fifteen and is walking up."

"_Walking_--on a night like this?" cried Lady Adela, all the mother in her awake at once. "Tell him to wait, and I will send the motor."

"Mr. Richard said he preferred walking, my lady," rejoined Milroy, growing more wooden as he approached the _clou_ of his narrative. "He said he would explain when he arrived. But the luggage-cart was to go down."

"For one portmanteau?"

"For the young lady's trunks, my lady."

"Young lady?" Lady Adela turned a puzzled countenance to her companion.

"Constance, dear, was not your luggage sent up with you?"

"Yes," replied Connie, scenting fun; "it was. I fancy this must be some other lady."

Light broke in on Lady Adela.

"Norah Puncheon, after all!" she exclaimed joyfully. "Her throat must be better, and that headstrong son of mine has compelled her to come down by the four-fifteen."

"And walk up in the rain," supplemented Connie.

"The thoughtless boy!" wailed Lady Adela insincerely. "He will give her pneumonia."

"Perhaps it is n't Miss Puncheon," suggested Connie soothingly.

"But, my dear," said Lady Adela, refraining with great forbearance from slapping the small but discouraging counsellor by her side, "who else can it be?" She turned to Milroy.

"Did Mr. Richard mention if he was bringing the young lady up with him?"

she asked.

"Yes, my lady," replied Milroy with unction--"he did."

"Did he mention her name, Milroy?" enquired Connie.

"No, Miss. He just said 'the young lady.' Will there be anything further, my lady?"

"No," snapped Lady Adela; and her aged retainer, as feverishly anxious beneath his perfectly schooled exterior to solve the mystery of his beloved Master d.i.c.k's latest escapade as his mistress, departed to lay another place for dinner.

In the hall there was a long silence. The wind roared round the house, and the rain drummed softly upon the diamond panes of the big oriel window.