She smiled and put out her hand. Sam, with a cold glance at the head waiter, whom he considered to be standing much too near and looking much too paternal, took it. He did more--he squeezed it. And an elderly gentleman of Napoleonic presence, who had been lunching with a cabinet minister in the main dining-room and was now walking through the court on his way back to his office, saw the proceedings through the large window and halted, spellbound. For a long instant he stood there, gaping. He saw Kay smile. He saw Sam take her hand. He saw Sam smile. He saw Sam hold her hand. And then it seemed to him that he had seen enough. Abandoning his intention of walking down Fleet Street, he hailed a cab. “There’s Lord Tilbury,” said Kay, looking out. “Yes?” said Sam. He was not interested in Lord Tilbury. “Going back to work, I suppose. Isn’t it about time you were?” “Perhaps it is. You wouldn’t care to come along and have a chat with your uncle?” “I may look in later. Just now I want to go to that messenger-boy office in Northumberland Avenue and send off a note.” “Important?” “It is, rather,” said Kay. “Willoughby Braddock wanted me to do something, and now I find that I shan’t be able to.” CHAPTER NINETEEN LORD TILBURY ENGAGES AN ALLY § 1 Although Lord Tilbury had not seen much of what had passed between Kay and Sam at the luncheon table, he had seen quite enough; and as he drove back to Tilbury House in his cab he was thinking hard and bitter thoughts of the duplicity of the modern girl. Here, he reflected, was one who, encountered at dinner on a given night, had as good as stated in set terms that she thoroughly disliked Sam Shotter. And on the very next afternoon, there she was, lunching with this same Sam Shotter, smiling at this same Sam Shotter and allowing this same Shotter to press her hand. It all looked very black to Lord Tilbury, and the only solution that presented itself to him was that the girl’s apparent dislike of Sam on the previous night had been caused by a lovers’ quarrel. He knew all about lovers’ quarrels, for his papers were full of stories, both short and in serial form, that dealt with nothing else. Oh, woman, woman! about summed up Lord Tilbury’s view of the affair.