And if, in the corner of the gun-room, there was a man among them who had ever ventured to hold Leila's smooth little hand, unrebuked, in days gone by, none the less he knew that Alderdene spoke truth; and none the less he knew that what witness he might be called to bear at the end of the end of all must only incriminate himself and not that young matron who now, before their very eyes, was budding again, reverting to the esoteric charm of youth reincarnated.
"A suit before a referee would settle him," mused Voucher; "he hasn't a leg to stand on. Lord! The same cat that tripped up Stephen Siward!"
Fleetwood's quick eyes glimmered for an instant in Quarrier's direction. Quarrier was in the billiard-room, out of earshot, practising balk-line problems with Major Belwether; and Fleetwood said: "The same cat that tripped up Stephen Siward. Yes. But who let her loose?"
"It was your dinner; you ought to know," said Voucher bluntly.
"I do know. He brought her"--nodding toward the billiard-room.
"Belwether?"
"No," yawned Fleetwood.
Somebody said presently: "Isn't he one of the Governors? Oh, I say, that was rather rough on Siward though."
"Yes, rough. The law of trespass ought to have operated; a man's liable for the damage done by his own live-stock."
"That's a brutal way of talking," said somebody. And the subject was closed with the entrance of Agatha in white flannels on her way to the squash court where she had an appointment with Quarrier.
"A strange girl," said somebody after she had disappeared with Quarrier.
"That pallor is stunning," said a big, ruddy youth, with sunburn on his neck and forehead.
"It isn't healthy," said Fleetwood.
"It attracts me," persisted the ruddy young man, voicing naively that curious truth concerning the attraction that disease so often exerts on health--the strange curiosity the normal has for the sub-normal--that fascination of the wholesome for the unhealthy. It is, perhaps, more curiosity than anything, unless, deep hidden under the normal, there lie one single, perverted nerve.
Sylvia, passing the hall, glanced in through the gun-room door with an absentminded smile at the men and their laughing greeting, as they rose with uplifted glasses to salute her.
"The sweetest of all," observed a man, disconsolately emptying his glass. "Oh irony! What a marriage!"
"Do you know any girl who would not change places with her?" asked another.
Every man there insisted that he knew one girl at least who would not exchange Sylvia's future for her own. That was very nice of them; it is to be hoped they believed it. Some of them did--for the moment, anyhow. Then Alderdene, blinking furiously, emitted one of his ear-racking laughs; and everybody, as usual, laughed too.