"Tell you what it is, my friend," said Peckover. "The sooner you bring yourself to consider Ulrica a thing of the past the better chance you'll have of making old bones. Ethel and Dagmar may not be all our fancy painted, but at least they haven't got a blood-thirsty Spanish nob hanging about them with traditions and a nasty way of talking polite flummery with a revolver playfully pointed at the vital parts of your anatomy all the time. You won't have a ducal freak poking his long nose in there." "Well, we had better go down, have a fling with the second quality beauties and then clear out of the place till things cool down," said Gage with the air of a man who has made up his mind. Accordingly, after an early luncheon, they went down to the Moat, and flirted so recklessly with the not unduly obdurate young ladies, that Lady Agatha was induced to dismiss from her mind a grand plan she had been formulating for the recapture of John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook, and even went so far as to canvass the respective claims of pink and apple-green in connexion with the general scheme of colour for a double bevy of bridesmaids. It was late, as late for safety as they could make it, when Gage and Peckover returned home, discussing plans for a sudden flight next morning. "Lady Ormstork called?" Gage asked Bisgood carelessly, as he turned into the smoking-room for a cigarette before going up to dress. "Yes, my lord. And Miss Buffkin." "You gave her ladyship my message?" "Yes, m'lord." "Did she say anything?" "Her ladyship said she would wait, my lord, as she had something very important to tell your lordship." "Ah," Gage said knowingly. "Did she wait long?" "Her ladyship and Miss Buffkin are in the drawing-room, my lord." The cigarette fell from Gage's parted lips, thrust out by a profane charge which exploded behind it. "In the----" he turned helplessly to Peckover. "Percival, old man, they're waiting for us," he gasped. "Anybody else?" Peckover inquired of Bisgood, with a vision of a pair of terrific eyes backed by a bald head and set off in front by a long nose and a gleaming revolver barrel. "No one else, sir," Bisgood answered with as much surprise as that functionary ever permitted himself. "Better scoot, eh?" suggested Peckover in a panic-stricken whisper, as the butler left them. "No. Let's go and hear what the old bird has to say," Gage replied, after a few moment's hesitation. "If any one is equal to tackling that Spanish nuisance she's the person. Let's go and hear how she takes it." CHAPTER XXXIII Lady Ormstork received them with pleasure tinged with just a shade of vexation. "We were so disappointed at not finding you at home to-day of all days," she exclaimed. "We heard this morning of an absurd misunderstanding which we were anxious to set right without delay. And we have been waiting nearly four hours." "You've had tea?" Gage suggested, somewhat beside the point. "Oh, yes, thank you," Miss Buffkin assured him.