“You don’t like that,” suggested Bulchester.  “You like ladies who lead in society.”

“Well,” assented Edmonson, “I know.  But she will have to set up for an oddity, and, you see, she has money enough to be able to afford it.  A fortune in her own right, and large expectations from the old gentleman who began with money and has never made a bad investment in his life.  Think of it!  Gerald Edmonson will keep open house and live rather differently from at present in his bachelor quarters; and all his old friends will be welcome.”

“What do you say to those we are going to meet to-night, who are to give us our farewell supper; you would not ask a set like that to a lady’s table?”

Edmonson laughed.

“Why, and if I did,” he answered, “Elizabeth Royal would never fathom them.  She might think they drank somewhat too much, and discover that they were noisy; but as to the wild pranks we have played, yes, you and I, Bulchester, I out of pure enjoyment of them, you, I do believe, more than half not to be behind other men of fashion, why, you might tell them to her safely, for she would never comprehend.  One can’t get along so well with her on the little nothings one says to other women, to be sure, but she has the greatest simplicity in the world, and that touch of evil that spices life is entirely beyond her.  But however that might be, I tell you this, my lord:  Gerald Edmonson is always master, and always will be.”

“Yes,” assented his hearer.

“I only hope the extent of my impecuniosity will not cross the water with me.  I have never pretended to be rich, but I have said that my expectations were excellent.  So they are; for you know, Bulchester, the heiress is not all my errand to these outlandish colonies.  I have expectations there.  Rather strange ones, to be sure, so strange, and to be come at so strangely, that if I can make anything out of them I shall enjoy it a thousand times more than by any stupid old way of inheritance.”

“It strikes me, though, you would not object to the stupid if a good plum should fall down on your head from an ancestral tree.”

Edmonson laughed.

“You have me there, Bul,” he said.  “But, on your honor, you are not to betray my plans, or I have no chance at all,” he added, suddenly facing his companion.

“What do you take me for, a traitor?”

“No,” exclaimed Edmonson with an oath.

“For a tattler, then?”

“No,” came the answer again.  “Only, inadvertence is sometimes as mischievous in its results.”

“I, inadvertent?” cried Bulchester.

His listener smiled slyly.  The other felt that caution was his strong point, and Edmonson’s diplomacy would not assault this vigorously; his aim had been merely to warn Bulchester and strengthen the defences.  Soon after this they reached the inn, where they were boisterously greeted by their companions, who had been waiting for them in what was then one of the fashionable public houses of London, though long since fallen out of date and forgotten.