Lady Caroline frowned.  This slowness in the uptake, coming so soon after her brother’s inattention, displeased her.

“No, no, no.  I mean you and Maud have been talking to each other for quite a long time, and she seemed very interested in what you were saying.  I hoped you might have some good news for me.”

Reggie’s face brightened.  He caught her drift.

“Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean.  No, there wasn’t anything of that sort or shape or order.”

“What were you saying to her, then, that interested her so much?”

“I was explaining how I landed dead on the pin with my spoon out of a sand-trap at the eleventh hole yesterday.  It certainly was a pretty ripe shot, considering.  I’d sliced into this baby bunker, don’t you know; I simply can’t keep ’em straight with the iron nowadays—­and there the pill was, grinning up at me from the sand.  Of course, strictly speaking, I ought to have used a niblick, but—­”

“Do you mean to say, Reggie, that, with such an excellent opportunity, you did not ask Maud to marry you?”

“I see what you mean.  Well, as a matter of absolute fact, I, as it were, didn’t.”

Lady Caroline uttered a wordless sound.

“By the way, mater,” said Reggie, “I forgot to tell you about that.  It’s all off.”

“What!”

“Absolutely.  You see, it appears there’s a chappie unknown for whom Maud has an absolute pash.  It seems she met this sportsman up in Wales last summer.  She was caught in the rain, and he happened to be passing and rallied round with his rain-coat, and one thing led to another.  Always raining in Wales, what!  Good fishing, though, here and there.  Well, what I mean is, this cove was so deucedly civil, and all that, that now she won’t look at anybody else.  He’s the blue-eyed boy, and everybody else is an also-ran, with about as much chance as a blind man with one arm trying to get out of a bunker with a tooth-pick.”

“What perfect nonsense!  I know all about that affair.  It was just a passing fancy that never meant anything.  Maud has got over that long ago.”

“She didn’t seem to think so.”

“Now, Reggie,” said Lady Caroline tensely, “please listen to me.  You know that the castle will be full of people in a day or two for Percy’s coming-of-age, and this next few days may be your last chance of having a real, long, private talk with Maud.  I shall be seriously annoyed if you neglect this opportunity.  There is no excuse for the way you are behaving.  Maud is a charming girl—­”

“Oh, absolutely!  One of the best.”

“Very well, then!”

“But, mater, what I mean to say is—­”

“I don’t want any more temporizing, Reggie!”

“No, no!  Absolutely not!” said Reggie dutifully, wishing he knew what the word meant, and wishing also that life had not become so frightfully complex.

“Now, this afternoon, why should you not take Maud for a long ride in your car?”