“I can’t thank you enough. You’ve done absolutely the right thing. There was nothing else but to carry it through with a boy of Tony’s temperament. I’m glad, gladder than I can tell you. But of course my husband will take it rather unpleasantly at first. He had ideas about Tony’s marrying, and he would have done anything he could to have prevented its happening like this. But now that it has happened, now that there’s nothing to be done but to accept it, I think it will soon be all right. But perhaps you had better tell him now at once, and get it over. He will be here in a minute.” At that instant they came in—Sir Richard, Rupert, Alice Du Cane, and Mrs. Lester. It was obvious at once that Sir Richard was angry. Rupert was amused and a little bored. Alice was excited, and Mrs. Lester tired and white under the eyes. “What’s this?” said Sir Richard, coming forward. “They tell me that Tony hasn’t been in all night. That he’s gone or something.” Then he caught sight of Maradick. “Ha! Maradick—Morning! Do you happen to know where the boy is?” Maradick thought that he could discern through the old man’s anger a very real anxiety, but it was a difficult moment. Lady Gale spoke. “Mr. Maradick has just been telling me——” she began. “Perhaps Alice and I——” said Mrs. Lester, and moved back to the door. Then Maradick took hold of things. “No, please don’t go. There’s nothing that anyone needn’t know, nothing. I have just been telling Lady Gale, Sir Richard, that your son was married yesterday at two o’clock at the little church outside the town, to a Miss Janet Morelli. They are now in Paris.” There was silence. No one spoke or moved. The situation hung entirely between Sir Richard and Maradick. Lady Gale’s eyes were all for her husband; the way that he took it would make a difference to the rest of their married lives. Sir Richard breathed heavily. His face went suddenly very white. Then in a low voice he said— “Married? Yesterday?” He seemed to be collecting his thoughts, trying to keep down the ungovernable passion that in a moment would overwhelm him. For a moment he swallowed it. Holding himself very straight he looked Maradick in the face. “And why has my dutiful son left the burden of this message to you?” “Because I have, from the beginning, been concerned in the affair. I have known about it from the first. I was witness of their marriage yesterday, and I saw them off at the station.” Sir Richard began to breathe heavily. The colour came back in a flood to his cheeks. His eyes were red. He stepped forward with his fist uplifted, but Rupert put a hand on his arm and his fist fell to his side. He could not speak coherently. “You—you—you”; and then “You dared? What the devil have you to do with my boy? With us? With our affairs? What the devil is it to do with you? You—you—damn you, sir—my boy—married to anybody, and because a——” Rupert again put his hand on his father’s arm and his words lingered in mid-air.