Sir Richard undressed, and went to bed.
The boots, who brought up his blue coat in the morning, and his top-boots, was a little surprised to find that he had exchanged bedchambers with his supposed nephew, but accepted his explanation that he disliked his original apartment with only an inward shrug. The Quality, he knew, were full of whims and oddities.
Sir Richard looked through his glass at his coat, which he had sent downstairs to be pressed, and said he felt sure the unknown presser had done his best. He next levelled the eyeglass at his top-boots, and sighed. But when he was asked if there were anything amiss, he said No, nothing: it was good for a man to be removed occasionally from civilization.
The top-boots stood side by side, glossily black and without a speck upon them of dust, or mud. Sir Richard shook his headsadly, and sighed again. He was missing his man, Biddle, in whose ingenious brain lay the secret of polishing boots so that you could see your face reflected in them.
But to anyone unacquainted with the art of Biddle Sir Richard’s appearance, when he presently descended the stairs, left little to be desired. There were no creases in the blue coat, his cravat would have drawn approval from Mr Brummell himself, and his hair was brushed into that state of cunning disorder known as the Windswept Style.
As he rounded the bend in the stair-case, he heard Miss Creed exchanging friendly salutations with a stranger. The stranger’s voice betrayed his identity to Sir Richard, whose eyes managed, for all their sleepiness, to take very good stock of Captain Trimble.
Sir Richard came down the last flight in a leisurely fashion, and interrupted Miss Creed’s harmless remarks, by saying in his most languid tone: ‘My good boy, I wish you will not converse with strangers. It is a most lamentable habit. Rid yourself of it, I beg!’
Pen looked round in surprise. It occurred to her that she had not known that her protector could sound so haughty, or look so – yes, so insufferably proud!
Captain Trimble turned too. He was a fleshy man, with a coarse, florid sort of good-looks, and a rather loud taste in dress. He said jovially: ‘Oh, I don’t mind the lad’s talking to me!’
Sir Richard’s hand sought his quizzing-glass, and raised it. It was said inhaut-toncircles that the two deadliest weapons against all forms of pretension were Mr Brummell’s lifted eyebrow, and Sir Richard Wyndham’s quizzing-glass. Captain Trimble, though thick-skinned, was left in no doubt of its blighting message. His cheeks grew dark, and his jaw began to jut belligerently.
‘And who might you be, my fine buck?’ he demanded.
‘I might be a number of different persons,’ drawled Sir Richard.
Pen’s eyes were getting rounder and rounder, for it appearedto her that this new and haughty Sir Richard was deliberately trying to provoke Captain Trimble into quarrelling with him.
For a moment it seemed as though he would succeed. Captain Trimble started forward, with his fists clenched, and an ugly look on his face. But just as he was about to speak, his expression changed, and he stopped in his tracks, and ejaculated: ‘You’re Beau Wyndham! Well, I’ll be damned!’
‘The prospect,’ said Sir Richard, bored, ‘leaves me unmoved.’
With the discovery of Sir Richard’s identity, the desire to come to blows with him seemed to have deserted the Captain. He gave a somewhat unconvincing laugh, and said that there was no offence.
The quizzing-glass focused upon his waistcoat. A shudder visibly shook Sir Richard. ‘You mistake – believe me, you mistake, sir. That waistcoat is an offence in itself.’
‘Oh, I know you dandies!’ said the Captain waggishly. ‘You’re full of quips. But we shan’t quarrel over a little thing like that. Oh, no!’
The quizzing-glass fell. ‘I am haunted by waistcoats,’ Sir Richard complained. ‘There was something with tobine stripes at Reading, horrible to any person of taste. There was a mustard-coloured nightmare at – Wroxham was it? No. I fancy, if memory serves me, Wroxham was rendered hideous by a catskin disaster with pewter buttons. The mustard-coloured nightmare came later. And now, to crown all –’
‘Catskin?’ interrupted Captain Trimble, his eyes fixed intently upon that disdainful countenance. ‘Catskin, did you say?’
‘Pray do not keep on repeating it!’ said Sir Richard. ‘The very thought of it –’
‘Look’ee, sir, I’m by way of being interested in a catskin waistcoat myself! Are you sure it was at Wroxham you saw it?’
‘A catskin waistcoat on its way to Bristol,’ said Sir Richard dreamily.
‘Bristol! Damme, I never thought – I thank you, Sir Richard! I thank you very much indeed!’ said Captain Trimble, andplunged down the passage leading to the stable-yard at the back of the inn.
Sir Richard watched him go, a faint, sweet smile on his lips. ‘There, now!’ he murmured. ‘An impetuous gentleman, I fear. Let it be a lesson to you, brat, not to confide too much in strangers.’
‘I didn’t!’ said Pen. ‘I merely –’
‘But he did,’ Sir Richard said. ‘A few chance words let fall from my tongue, and our trusting acquaintance is already calling for his horse. I want my breakfast.’
‘But why have you sent him to Bristol?’ Pen demanded.
‘Well, I wanted to get rid of him,’ he replied, strolling into the parlour.
‘I thought you were trying to pick a quarrel with him.’
