“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.”

“I think you ought to attend to them this morning,” said Alice, gently persistent.  It really perturbed this girl to feel that she was not doing work enough to merit her generous salary.  And on the subject of the history of the Marshmoreton family she was an enthusiast.  It had a glamour for her.

Lord Marshmoreton’s fingers relaxed their hold.  Throughout the rose-garden hundreds of spared thrips went on with their morning meal, unwitting of doom averted.

“Oh, all right, all right, all right!  Come into the library.”

“Very well, Lord Marshmoreton.”  Miss Faraday turned to Lady Caroline.  “I have been looking up the trains, Lady Caroline.  The best is the twelve-fifteen.  It has a dining-car, and stops at Belpher if signalled.”

“Are you going away, Caroline?” inquired Lord Marshmoreton hopefully.

“I am giving a short talk to the Social Progress League at Lewisham.  I shall return tomorrow.”