‘I saw him,’ said Redworth.  ’He ’s one of the new set of noblemen who take bribes to serve as baits for transactions in the City.  They help to the ruin of their order, or are signs of its decay.  We won’t judge it by him.  He favoured me with his “word of honour” that the thing you heard was entirely a misstatement, and so forth:—­apologized, I suppose.  He mumbled something.’

‘A thorough cur!’

‘He professed his readiness to fight, if either of us was not contented.’

’He spoke to the wrong man.  I’ve half a mind to ride back and have him out for that rascal “osculation” and the lady unwilling!—­and she a young one, a girl, under the protection of the house!  By Jove!  Redworth, when you come to consider the scoundrels men can be, it stirs a fellow’s bile.  There’s a deal of that sort of villany going—­and succeeding sometimes!  He deserves the whip or a bullet.’

‘A sermon from Lukin Dunstane might punish him.’

’Oh!  I’m a sinner, I know.  But, go and tell one woman of another woman, and that a lie!  That’s beyond me.’

’The gradations of the deeps are perhaps measurable to those who are in them.’

‘The sermon’s at me—­pop!’ said Sir Lukin.  ’By the way, I’m coming round to think Diana Warwick was right when she used to jibe at me for throwing up my commission.  Idleness is the devil—­or mother of him.  I manage my estates; but the truth is, it doesn’t occupy my mind.’

‘Your time.’

‘My mind, I say.’

‘Whichever you please.’

’You’re crusty to-day, Redworth.  Let me tell you, I think—­and hard too, when the fit’s on me.  However, you did right in stopping—­I’ll own—­a piece of folly, and shutting the mouths of those two; though it caused me to come in for a regular drencher.  But a pretty woman in a right-down termagant passion is good theatre; because it can’t last, at that pace; and you’re sure of your agreeable tableau.  Not that I trust her ten minutes out of sight—­or any woman, except one or two; my wife and Diana Warwick.  Trust those you’ve tried, old boy.  Diana Warwick ought to be taught to thank you; though I don’t know how it’s to be done.’

‘The fact of it is,’ Redworth frowned and rose, ’I’ve done mischief.  I had no right to mix myself in it.  I’m seldom caught off my feet by an impulse; but I was.  I took the fever from you.’

He squared his figure at the window, and looked up on a driving sky.

‘Come, let’s play open cards, Tom Redworth,’ said Sir Lukin, leaving the table and joining his friend by the window.  ’You moral men are doomed to be marrying men, always; and quite right.  Not that one doesn’t hear a roundabout thing or two about you:  no harm.  Very much the contrary:—­as the world goes.  But you’re the man to marry a wife; and if I guess the lady, she’s a sensible girl and won’t be jealous.  I ’d swear she only waits for asking.’

‘Then you don’t guess the lady,’ said Redworth.