"Katherine!" roared Mr. Montgomerie. "Will you listen when I speak--burrrr!" and he thumped his fist on the table.
Poor Lady Katherine almost jumped, and the china rattled.
"Forgive me, Anderson," she said, humbly; "you were saying----?"
"Campion has thrown me over," glared Mr. Montgomerie.
"Then I have perhaps the very thing for you," Lady Katherine said, in a relieved way, returning to her letters. "Sophia Merrenden writes this morning, and among other things tells me of her nephew, Lord Robert Vavasour--you know, Torquilstone's half-brother. She says he is the most charming young man and a wonderful shot--she even suggests" (looking back a page), "that he might be useful to us, if we are short of a gun."
"Damned kind of her!" growled Mr. Montgomerie.
I hope they did not notice, but I had suddenly such a thrill of pleasure that I am sure my cheeks got red. I felt frightfully excited to hear what was going to happen.
"Merrenden, as you know, is the best judge of shooting in England," Lady Katherine went on, in an injured voice. "Sophia is hardly likely to recommend his nephew so highly if he were not pretty good."
"But you don't know the puppy, Katherine."
My heart fell.
"That is not the least consequence; we are almost related. Merrenden is my first cousin, you forget that, I suppose!"
Fortunately I could detect that Lady Katherine was becoming obstinate and offended. I drank some more coffee. Oh, how lovely if Lord Robert comes!
Mr. Montgomerie "burrred" a lot first, but Lady Katherine got him round, and before breakfast was over it was decided she should write to Lord Robert and ask him to come to the shoot. As we were all standing looking out of the window at the dripping rain, I heard her say, in a low voice: "Really, Anderson, we must think of the girls sometimes. Torquilstone is a confirmed bachelor and a cripple--Lord Robert will certainly one day be duke."
"Well, catch him if you can," said Mr. Montgomerie. He is coarse sometimes.
I am not going to let myself think much about Lord Robert. Mr. Carruthers has been a lesson to me. But if he does come, I wonder if Lady Katherine will think it funny of me not saying I knew him when she first spoke of him. It is too late now, so it can't be helped.
The Mackintosh party arrived this afternoon. Marriage must have quite different effects on some people. Numbers of the married women we saw in London were lovely--prettier, I always heard, than they had been before--but Mary Mackintosh is perfectly awful. She can't be more than twenty-seven, but she looks forty, at least; and stout, and sticking out all in the wrong places, and flat where the stick-outs ought to be. And the four children. The two eldest look much the same age, the next a little smaller, and there is a baby, and they all squall, and although they seem to have heaps of nurses, poor Mr. Mackintosh has to be a kind of under one. He fetches and carries for them, and gives his handkerchief when they slobber, but perhaps it is he feels proud that a person of his size had these four enormous babies almost all at once like that.