Lalage, with mischief in her dark eyes, swooped down upon the trio. The unhappy Peckover's arms being fast held, the only way that occurred to him of avoiding the coming assault was to endeavour to sit down on the floor, in which he succeeded, after a short and spirited attempt on the part of his captors to defeat the manoeuvre. "I have a prior and a stronger claim on Mr. Gage," said Lalage with calm determination; "and I mean to enforce it, eh, Carnaby?" "Just let me get out of this rotten armour," growled her brother, thus appealed to. "I'll----" "But it's not my fault," urged Peckover plaintively, from his undignified position on the floor. His weakness was not, however, shared by the ladies who, having him fast in their grips, knelt, under the exigences of the situation, beside him. "He is engaged to me," Ethel maintained stoutly. "You are engaged to Sharnbrook," objected Dagmar. "I am not," she denied loudly and with decision. "All right! That's settled," exclaimed a blithe voice from the gloom, from which next moment the said John Arbuthnot Sharnbrook emerged. CHAPTER XXIV The real and resuscitated Lord Quorn had all this while been having a deplorable time of it. Driven from the _Three Pigeons_ in consequence of that hostelry being the abode of the terrible Leos, denied access to his own home through the same fear, he had betaken himself to a neighbouring village, and there spent his days, only venturing towards Staplewick after nightfall, when he would prowl about the Towers like an uneasy, discontented ghost. But now the small sum he had been able to raise on the little jewellery he wore was all but spent, and he was becoming desperate. Every day he expected to find that his trackers from the Antipodes had departed in disgust; every night he was disappointed. Surely, thought he, with the false Lord Quorn to all intents established, what have these nuisances to wait for? Surely even the self-and-brother-reliant Lalage can scarcely be stupid enough to suppose that she had a chance of catching the substituted lord of Staplewick. If he has the cleverness and enterprise to fill that position backed by his friend's money he will hardly be such a rank idiot as to allow himself to be snapped up by those Australian sharks. Meanwhile the position for the real owner was drawing to a point when something would have to be done. Necessary as it was for him to lie low, it was yet more necessary for him to live, and his resources were now about exhausted.