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Beddow, the keeper of the shop; and the narrow door in the shutters closed. The last stream of light was abruptly cut off. The face of the Stores was black. All the opposite side of the roadway was now black. There were no more silhouettes. Mr. Beddow's cheeks were very fat, and when he smiled his eyes disappeared into slits just behind the top of his bulging cheeks. He wore a light frizzly beard.
His frankness took the form of communicating some new disparaging criticism, astutely attributed to Lady Beddow, every time he was paid a visit. You're no exception, my dear fellow, though you probably don't notice it in yourself. As Lady Beddow was saying to me this morning, 'Poor Lord Taborley, he has a rambling mind. Most likely it's a species of shell-shock.
Suddenly with a cavalier smile of conquest, which was strangely unwarranted, Tabs swung himself to his feet. "Well, Sir Tobias, we've talked for more than our half hour. After all, it doesn't matter a continental what you, or I, or Lady Beddow feels. It's Terry's feelings that count. I shall know what she feels before the afternoon is ended."
You tell me that, at the time that I was being accepted, you yourself were hoping to be engaged to Miss Beddow; then you hand me this letter. What do you suppose I infer? What would any man infer? That your promise to keep my existence a secret from Ann is conditional on the breaking of my engagement with Miss Beddow." "Handing you Ann's letter wouldn't do that.
Porter stood before them, neatly laundered, with the old suspicious meekness in her glance. "Good morning, Porter. We've come to see Miss Beddow. We've been told that she's staying with my sister." "She is, your Ladyship. But none of them are down. She arrived so late and unexpected."
"Didn't I tell you," he asked patiently, "that you'd find it difficult to believe a good many things before I had ended? I had an appointment to see Miss Beddow at her father's house this morning at eleven. Before I'd finished breakfast she was visiting me instead. She had called to make two requests: that I would see you to-day and get her promise back, and that I'd become engaged to her myself."
There was a confused gabbling and buzzing of voices, out of which the suave tones of the intruder emerged triumphant, saying, "This is Sir Tobias Beddow. Can I speak with Lord Taborley?" Perhaps Maisie had heard. At all events, the moment Sir Tobias declared himself the line cleared.
Three husbands in four and a half years, plus a risky flirtation with a married man were not the credentials of an honorable character. If he followed the advice of Sir Tobias Beddow, he would seek to assess her price at once. But he had never been accustomed to regard women in that light as a sex whose virtue could be inflated or depressed by the increase or shrinkage of a balance at the bank.
Sir Tobias and his wife sat at either end had they known it, for all the world like judges. Lady Beddow was a proud, unbending woman, gracious to her own sort, unquestioningly respectful to those above her, tender in a practical way to those below her and coldly scrutinizing to any one who tapped at her door claiming to be an equal.
The butler in the shadows had turned his back non-committally and was making a pretense of fiddling with the next course. Lady Beddow sat very upright and startled, grasping her knife and fork as though they helped to support her. The only person who was still doing justice to the meal was the worn-out version of Shakespeare, who was responsible for the storm.
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