It was not until dinner was nearly over that the Viscount noticed that he was being waited on by his valet. Since the party consisted of Lord Wrotham, the Honourable Ferdy Fakenham, and Mr Ringwood, he had no hesitation in demanding the reason for this departure from the normal, freely hazarding the guess that Groombridge was lying incapable on the pantry floor. Bootle, who disapproved of such unceremonious behaviour, returned a non-committal answer; but Jason, who was waiting to deliver the next course into his hands, put his head into the room and announced that both Groombridges having piked on the bean the Missus was cooking the dinner, and in bang-up style.

Upon receipt of this amazing information the whole party repaired at once to the kitchen, Sherry having the forethought to take the wine decanter along with him, and Ferdy pausing only to secrete his watch and chain in one of the vases on the dining-room mantelpiece. Hero, delightfully unconscious of dishevelled tresses, flushed cheeks, and a smut on her nose, made them welcome. They drank her health, ate up all the apricot tartlets she had prepared, sampled the contents of the jars on the big dresser, and wondered that they should never before have had the happy thought of invading a kitchen. After that they swept Hero off with them upstairs, leaving the servants to wash up the dishes. Bootle and the superior abigail exchanged speaking glances, the kitchen maid retired to indulge a mild fit of hysterics in the scullery, and Jason, seating himself at his east at the table, requested the pageboy to flick him some panam and cash. This intelligent lad, who had for months been enriching an already varied vocabulary from Jason’s store, at once complied with the request by cutting the Tiger a large slice of bread and cheese.

On the following day, Bootle, whose sense of what was due to himself would not allow of a repetition of the previous night’s performance, volunteered to find and install a respectable couple to fill the Groombridges’ places. He magically produced a cousin of his own, who, with his wife, almost immediately took possession of the kitchen. There was no noticeable diminution in the household bills, but since Mrs Bradgate grilled kidneys just as Sherry liked them, and always agreed smilingly with everything Hero said; and as Bradgate’s depredations on the cellar were too discreet to attract attention, the young couple were able to congratulate themselves on having made a change for the better.

Sherry’s more personal affairs seemed to be on the mend too, his friends Revesby and Brockenhurst having counselled him to alter his habits a little. So instead of pursuing his ill fortune at Watier’s, where they played hazard and macao for stakes varying from ten shillings to two hundred pounds, he began to patronize a snug little establishment in Pall Mall, which was presided over by a charming female of considerable address, and where rouge et noir and roulette were extensively played. Sherry passed several successful evenings in this house, and began to nourish the hope that he would soon find himself up in the stirrups again. His uncle, hearing of this new departure, cast up his eyes, and said he washed his hands of the boy.

Others besides Prosper Verelst and Mr Stoke regarded Sherry’s gaming excesses with disfavour. Ferdy Fakenham, dining at Limmer’s Hotel with his brother and Mr Ringwood, actually said that something ought to be done about it, adding hopefully that he thought it might answer tolerably well if Gil spoke to Sherry. Mr Ringwood declined this office with great firmness, saying that he was not Sherry’s cousin.

“George might drop him a hint,” said Ferdy dubiously. “I wouldn’t set any store by what George said myself, but Sherry might.”

“Where is George?” asked the Honourable Marmaduke. “Thought he was dining with us tonight?”

Ferdy sighed. “No. He’s gone off to the Cowpers’ ball. Poor fellow! Don’t like to tell him, but the odds are shortening at the clubs: the time was when you could get tens anywhere against Severn’s coming up to scratch, but no one’s offering better than evens now, and I shouldn’t be at all surprised if before long it’s odds on.”

“Ah!” said Marmaduke profoundly. “What are the odds against the Milborne’s accepting him, though?”

Ferdy stared at him. “Wouldn’t find a taker, Duke.”

“Wouldn’t I, my tulip?” retorted his sapient brother. “Let me tell you that that fellow, Revesby, is a good deal fancied by the knowing ones. They say he’s been making the running these last few weeks.”

“You don’t mean it!” said Ferdy, thunderstruck.

“I never liked the Incomparable above half myself,” said Mr Ringwood, “but I never heard there was any harm in the girl, and I don’t believe it. She wouldn’t have him.”

“Just the sort of rum customer females take fancies to,” said Marmaduke.

Mr Ringwood considered this, and was obliged to agree that there was much in what his friend said. “Not that I give a button whom she marries,” he said, refilling his glass. “All I say is, it’s a pity Sherry has a fancy for the fellow. Got my reasons for thinking he’s badly dipped. Bad enough when he’s full of frisk; devilish dangerous when he’s aground. Wonder if that’s why he’s throwing his handkerchief towards the Incomparable?”

“You know Mrs Capel’s place in Pall Mall?” asked Ferdy.

“Heard of it,” replied Mr Ringwood. “Sharps and flats.”

“Well, Sherry’s taken to going there.”

“He has?” Mr Ringwood said, shocked.

Ferdy nodded gloomily. “Plays rouge et noir there.”

“Bad, very bad!” Mr Ringwood said. “What the deuce does he do it for? Don’t mind a fellow’s gaming a trifle: do it myself! but it’s getting to be a curst habit with Sherry! What’s come over him?”

“Revesby,” replied Marmaduke shortly. He pressed his thumb down on the table. “Got Sherry there. Only has to crook his finger: Sherry’s off. Same with Tallerton. Saw it happen.”

“Tallerton!” exclaimed Mr Ringwood, staring.

The elder Mr Fakenham bowed his head portentously. “You know what happened to Tallerton, Gil?”

“He had an accident when he was out shooting,” replied Mr Ringwood slowly.

“Blew his brains out,” said Marmaduke.

“Perfectly true,” corroborated Ferdy. “All to pieces, he was. Hushed it up, of course, but there it is. Plain as a pikestaff. Duke had it from Nat Tallerton. The thing is, can’t have Sherry doing the same. Dash it, cousin of ours! Besides — Sherry, y’know!”

“Sherry wouldn’t!” Mr Ringwood said positively.

“No, because Revesby’s claws ain’t firm enough in him yet,” said Marmaduke.

Mr Ringwood sat up. “What are we going to do?” he demanded.

“Can’t do anything,” replied Marmaduke. “If you don’t know Sherry, I do. Never would listen to reason, and the only time I tried to use my influence on him he went straight off and did the very thing we didn’t want him to do.”

“That’s Sherry all over,” agreed Ferdy. “Obstinate! Like it from a child. No managing him at all.”

“Lady Sheringham might contrive to cheek him,” suggested Marmaduke.

Mr Ringwood shook his head.

“She’s his wife,” insisted Marmaduke. “Dare say he’d listen to her.”

“Well, he wouldn’t,” said Mr Ringwood, frowning at his glass.

“I don’t see that. Taking little thing — still a bride! Stands to reason!”

“No, it don’t!” Mr Ringwood said curtly. “Got to think of something else.”

“That’s it,” agreed Ferdy. “Open his eyes! Might tell him about Tallerton.”

“He wouldn’t believe you. Tell you what, Ferdy: we shall have to think about it.”

They were still — in their leisure moments — considering the problem, when fate took an unexpected hand in the affair.

Chapter Fifteen

EVER SINCE THE EVENING WHEN LORD WROTHAM had escorted Hero to Almack’s Assembly Rooms in his stead, Sherry had been careful to afford no other altruistic gentleman an opportunity for displaying his chivalry. If Hero were invited to attend the Assembly under some matron’s wing, he hailed this as a reprieve, and took himself blithely off on his own amusements; but if no matron came forward he offered himself up on the altar of duty with a very good grace, even going so far as to check any attempt on Hero’s part to convince him that she would be pleased to stay at home. Heedless his lordship might be, but however little, during the twenty-four years of his existence, he had been in the habit of considering any other desires than his own, he was not deliberately selfish, and he would have thought it a shocking thing to have condemned his wife to forgo a pleasure she obviously enjoyed merely because he himself would have preferred to have been disporting himself in quite another fashion. It was true that when he had so lightheartedly embarked on matrimony he had not bargained for the obligations attached to it; it was equally true that he had warned Hero that he had no intention of altering his habits to suit her convenience. He had moulded his ideas on the conduct of various sportive young matrons of his acquaintance, who certainly felt no overmastering desire to keep their husbands at their sides, but contrived — perfectly discreetly, to be sure — to amuse themselves without these complaisant gentlemen. But Sherry had realized early in his married career that Hero differed essentially from such worldly-wise ladies. Having neither the training that would have fitted her for fashionable life, nor relatives to whom she could turn, she was dependent upon her husband to a degree that would have alarmed him very much had he known at the outset how it would be. Within a month of their taking up their residence in Half Moon Street, it had been borne in upon his lordship that his wife was no more fit to carve her way through life than the kitten he called her. His lordship, who had never known responsibility, or shown the least ability to regulate his own career on respectable lines, found himself sole lord and master of a confiding little creature who placed implicit faith in his judgment, and relied upon him not only to guide her footsteps, but to rescue her from the consequences of her own ignorance. A man with a colder heart than Sherry’s would have shrugged and turned a blind eye to his wife’s difficulties. But the Viscount’s heart was not cold, and just as his protective instinct had once made him search all night through the woods at Sheringham Place for a favourite dog which had dug deep into a rabbit burrow and had been trapped there, so it compelled him to take such care of his Hero as occurred to him. She had always looked up to him and adored him, and while he took this for granted he was by no means oblivious to it, and did his best to be kind to her. He was amused, but a little touched, to discover that no deeper felicity was known to her than to go about in his company; she would grow out of that soon enough, he supposed, quite forgetting that when she had shown a willingness to go out with Lord Wrotham the instinct of possessiveness in him had led him to discourage such practices in no uncertain manner.