Larpent’s eyes came definitely down to him, grimly contemptuous.  “Do you also suppose that would be the same thing?” he said.

Bunny flushed a little, but he accepted the rebuff with a good grace.  “I don’t know, sir.  You see, I’ve never been the captain of a yacht.”

Larpent’s hard visage relaxed a little.  He resumed his contemplation of the distant pine-woods in silence.

Bunny got up whistling and began to stroll about the room.  He was never still for long.  He was not very familiar with the state reception-rooms of Burchester Castle and he found plenty to interest him.

Several minutes passed, and he had almost forgotten the silent man who leaned against the fire-place, when suddenly Larpent came out of his melancholy reverie and spoke.

“How long has the child been with these Boltons?”

Bunny paused at the further end of the room.  “Let’s see!  It must be some time now—­practically ever since the wreck.  It must be about six weeks.  Yes; she came just before I left to take on this job—­the week of the Graydown Meetings.”  Bunny’s eyes kindled at the memory.  “We had some sport the day she came, I remember; quite a little flutter.  In fact we soared so high that I thought we were going to create a sensation, and then”—­Bunny whistled dramatically—­“down we came with a rush, and I was broke!” He began to laugh.  “It’s rather a shame to tell you, isn’t it?  But you won’t give me away?  We’ve never done it since.”

“I shan’t give anyone away,” said Larpent grimly.

“Good!  You’re a sport, I can see.”

The genuine appreciation in Bunny’s voice brought an icy glimmer of amusement to the elder man’s eyes, but he made no verbal comment.

Again a silence fell, and Bunny came strolling back, a smile on his handsome boyish face.

“Fine place this,” he remarked presently.  “It’s a pity Saltash is here so little.  He only comes about three times a year, and then only for a couple of nights at a time.  There’s heaps of game in the woods and no one to shoot it.”

“He probably knows his own business best,” remarked Larpent.

“Oh, probably.  But the place is wasted on him for all that.”  Bunny spoke with a frown.  “Why on earth he doesn’t marry and settle down I can’t think.  Can’t you persuade him to?”

“No,” said Larpent quite definitely.

Bunny glanced at him.  “I don’t know why not.  I know he’s considered to have gone the pace a bit, but after all he’s no worse than a hundred others.  Why the devil shouldn’t he marry?”

Larpent shrugged his shoulders.  “Don’t ask me!” he said.

“Well, he ought to,” maintained Bunny.  “If you have any influence with him, you ought to persuade him to.”

“I haven’t,” said Larpent.

Bunny flung away impatiently.  “It’s a confounded shame—­a gorgeous family place like this and no one but servants to live in it!”