This House to Let. Le Queux William

wild, excitable Irishman, whatever is in my mind has to come out. Please forgive me; I know my sister Norah never will.”

      He looked appealingly at the girl who sat there, calm and self-possessed as always, with a slight expression of contempt upon her charming face.

      “I have already made excuses for you to Captain Murchison and Mr Pomfret,” she said coldly.

      The visitors were very much embarrassed. What could they say to this dreadful person who seemed so utterly lacking in all the qualities of good breeding? Hugh remained silent, Pomfret opened his lips and murmured something about the whole affair being very regrettable.

      But these somewhat incoherent remarks were quite enough to restore Mr Burton to his normal state of easy buoyancy. He smiled affably.

      “So that is all over. Well, I am delighted to see you, and it will not be my fault if your first visit is your last. Now, I propose you come round and have a little bit of dinner with us soon, so that we may get to know each other better. Any night that you are at liberty will suit us. We are not overwhelmed with invitations, as you can understand from what I have told you.”

      If Murchison had been by himself, he would have politely shelved the invitation. Miss Burton, who took after her English mother, was quite decent and ladylike. The brother was insufferable. Vulgarity, so to speak, oozed from him. He was offensive even in his geniality. In short, he was impossible.

      But Pomfret took the wind out of his senior’s sails.

      “Sorry we are quite full up this week, but hardly anything on next. Shall we say Monday?”

      Miss Burton took the matter out of her brother’s hands by turning directly to Murchison.

      “Monday, of course, will suit us. Will it suit you?” she asked him pointedly.

      Taken by surprise, the unhappy young man could only mutter a reluctant affirmative. A few minutes later they left, pledged to partake of the Burtons’ hospitality on the following Monday.

      When they were safely outside, Murchison spoke severely to his brother officer.

      “You’ve let us in for a nice thing. If you had left it to me, I would have got out of that dinner somehow.”

      “But I didn’t want to get out of it,” replied the unabashed junior. “We knew the brother was pretty bad all along. I don’t know that on the whole he is much worse than we imagined. But she’s a ripping girl. I want to see more of her.”

      “You silly young ass,” growled Murchison; “I believe you’ve fallen head over ears in love with her.”

      And Pomfret, one of the most mercurial and light-hearted of subalterns, answered quite gravely:

      “I rather fancy I have. I’ve never met a girl who appealed to me in quite the same sort of way.”

      Chapter Three

      As a result of his visit to Rosemount, Hugh Murchison was very perturbed in his mind. He blamed himself severely for having been tempted into that rather intimate conversation at the tea-shop. Miss Burton was attractive enough, and ladylike enough, to excuse any man for taking advantage of his obvious opportunities, but he had been a fool to go farther. He ought never to have set his foot in the house of people of whom he knew nothing.

      It was all Jack Pomfret’s fault, he decided hastily. It was his influence, his keen desire to make the girl’s acquaintance, that had weighed down his friend’s prudence. For, if left to himself, Hugh was quite sure that he would have dallied and dallied till all inclination to call at Rosemount had died down.

      And Pomfret had owned to being greatly impressed with the fair young châtelaine. He had admitted that he had never met a girl who had appealed to him in quite the same sort of way. In fact, it was easy to see he had fallen desperately in love with her.

      And Jack was just one of those light-hearted, susceptible sort of chaps who have not an atom of common-sense in their composition, who will obey their impulses, regardless of consequences.

      And he was not his own master. His career was practically at the disposal of his somewhat puritanical aunt. It was just on the cards that Jack would be mad enough to propose to this girl who had so bewitched him. One could imagine how the aunt would receive such a communication.

      There was one little ray of hope, however. If Jack did commit such a crowning folly, he would be far too honourable not to acquaint Miss Burton with his circumstances. Hugh was fairly convinced that the young lady knew how to take care of herself. And, even if she did fall in love with Jack, as he had done with her, and be inclined to make a fool of herself, there was the objectionable brother to be reckoned with. He would certainly not allow his sister to engage herself to a man, except with the consent of that man’s family.

      All the same, it was as well to avoid any embarrassing entanglements, if possible. It is easy to retrace your steps when you have only just started.

      With this object in view, Murchison sought his friend on the Sunday preceding the day on which they were to present themselves at Rosemount.

      “Jack, old man, I have been thinking – ” he began.

      Mr Pomfret lifted a warning finger. “My dear friend and mentor, don’t indulge in such violent processes. It’s very bad for you.”

      “Don’t be an ass, Jack. You are not really funny when you say that sort of thing. I’ve been thinking over this business to-morrow, and, frankly, I don’t relish the prospect. We had better cut it out.”

      Pomfret’s face took on an obstinate expression. “You are speaking for yourself, of course. For my part, I don’t intend to break my appointment. In my opinion, it would be an awfully low-down thing to do. If you didn’t want to go, you shouldn’t have accepted.”

      It was evident the young man was not in a very reasonable frame of mind, equally evident he would require very careful handling.

      “Now, Jack, don’t get off the handles. You know you are an awfully impetuous chap, and that I have much the cooler head of the two. I have been thinking it all out the last day or two, and I don’t like the look of it.”

      “You informed me just now that you had been thinking,” replied Mr Pomfret in the same sarcastic strain. “There is no need to dwell upon the fact. It is obvious.”

      But the elder man was not to be ruffled. If anything unpleasant came of this sudden acquaintance he would lay the blame on himself for having mentioned that little incident of the tea-shop, and inspired the mercurial Jack’s love of the daring and adventurous.

      “I don’t know that I did accept, as a matter of fact, except by implication. I was about to return an evasive answer, leave it in the air, so to speak, when you cut in and jumped at the invitation for both.”

      This was true, and Mr Pomfret’s air lost a little of its jaunty confidence. “Well, if you think I lugged you in, get out of it yourself. Of course you will have to tell some beastly lie that they will see through at once. Anyway I am going, and that’s flat.”

      “If you go, I shall go,” said Hugh firmly. “But I would like you to listen to me for a few moments, and put things before you as they present themselves to me.”

      “Fire away, then,” was Pomfret’s answer, but it was delivered in a very ungracious tone.

      “Of course we are both agreed about the brother,” began Hugh mildly.

      The other interrupted impatiently: “The brother be hanged. We are not going to the house for the brother’s sake, but because of the sister. What’s the use of blinking the fact? If you had met him in the tea-shop instead of her, I don’t suppose you would have wasted a word on him, no more should I. But I don’t see why that pretty girl should be ostracised because of him.”

      “I don’t quite see, under the circumstances, how you can separate them,” pursued the obstinate Hugh. “I should like to turn off, just for a moment to the sister, and consider her.”

      “Go ahead,” said Mr Pomfret in a somewhat sullen tone. He was keeping his impulsive