It was evident the young man was not in a very reasonable frame of mind, equally evident he would require very careful handling. "Now, Jack, don't get off the handles. You know you are an awfully impetuous chap, and that I have much the cooler head of the two. I have been thinking it all out the last day or two, and I don't like the look of it." "You informed me just now that you had been thinking," replied Mr Pomfret in the same sarcastic strain. "There is no need to dwell upon the fact. It is obvious." But the elder man was not to be ruffled. If anything unpleasant came of this sudden acquaintance he would lay the blame on himself for having mentioned that little incident of the tea-shop, and inspired the mercurial Jack's love of the daring and adventurous. "I don't know that I did accept, as a matter of fact, except by implication. I was about to return an evasive answer, leave it in the air, so to speak, when you cut in and jumped at the invitation for both." This was true, and Mr Pomfret's air lost a little of its jaunty confidence. "Well, if you think I lugged you in, get out of it yourself. Of course you will have to tell some beastly lie that they will see through at once. Anyway I am going, and that's flat." "If you go, I shall go," said Hugh firmly. "But I would like you to listen to me for a few moments, and put things before you as they present themselves to me." "Fire away, then," was Pomfret's answer, but it was delivered in a very ungracious tone. "Of course we are both agreed about the brother," began Hugh mildly. The other interrupted impatiently: "The brother be hanged. We are not going to the house for the brother's sake, but because of the sister. What's the use of blinking the fact? If you had met him in the tea-shop instead of her, I don't suppose you would have wasted a word on him, no more should I. But I don't see why that pretty girl should be ostracised because of him." "I don't quite see, under the circumstances, how you can separate them," pursued the obstinate Hugh. "I should like to turn off, just for a moment to the sister, and consider her." "Go ahead," said Mr Pomfret in a somewhat sullen tone. He was keeping his impulsive and fiery nature under control, out of his great respect for his friend. But it was very doubtful if he would stand much criticism even from one so respected. "I have not a word to say against her appearance or her manners. I will go further, and say there is not a girl in Blankfield, or for the matter of that in the `county' itself, who gives the impression of a thorough gentlewoman more convincingly than she does." Pomfret's face brightened at these words. "Oh, then you admit that, and you have knocked about the world a few years longer than I have. I am of the same opinion, but if you say it, it must be so."