'He is a famous angler,' said Walsh; 'indeed, I have been told that his bursts of passion are over in five minutes, except when he catches a poacher.'
Rob winced, for Walsh did not know of the fishing episode.
'His temper,' continued Walsh, 'is such that his male servants are said never to know whether he will give them a shilling or a whirl of his cane—until they get it. The gardener takes a look at him from behind a tree before venturing to address him. I suppose his poverty is at the bottom of it, for the estate is mortgaged heavily, and he has had to cut down trees, and even to sell his horses. The tenants seem to like him, though, and if they dared they would tell him not to think himself bound to give them this annual dinner. There are numberless stories of his fierce temper, and as many of his extravagant kindness. According to his servants, he once emptied his pocket to a beggar at a railway station, and then discovered that he had no money for his own ticket. As for the ne'er-do-weels, their importuning makes him rage, but they know he will fling them something in the end if they expose their rags sufficiently.'
'So,' said Rob, who did not want to like the colonel, 'he would not trouble about them if they kept their misery to themselves. That kind of man is more likely to be a philanthropist in your country than in mine.'
'Keep that for a Burns dinner,' suggested Walsh.
Rob heard now how Tomlinson came to be nicknamed Umbrage.
'He was sub-editing one night,' Walsh explained, 'during the time of an African war, and things were going so smoothly that he and Penny were chatting amicably together about the advantages of having a few Latin phrases in a leader, such as dolce far niente, or cela va sans dire——'
'I can believe that,' said Rob, 'of Penny certainly.'
'Well, in the middle of the discussion an important war telegram arrived, to the not unnatural disgust of both. As is often the case, the message was misspelt, and barely decipherable, and one part of it puzzled Tomlinson a good deal. It read: "Zulus have taken Umbrage; English forces had to retreat." Tomlinson searched the map in vain for Umbrage, which the Zulus had taken; and Penny, being in a hurry, was sure it was a fortress. So they risked it, and next morning the chief lines in the Mirror contents bill were: "Latest News of the War; Capture of Umbrage by the Zulus."'
By this time the reporters had passed into the grounds of the castle, and, being late, were hurrying up the grand avenue. It was the hour and the season when night comes on so sharply, that its shadow may be seen trailing the earth as a breeze runs along a field of corn. Heard from a height, the roar of the Dome among rocks might have been the rustle of the surrounding trees in June; so men and women who grow old together sometimes lend each other a voice. Walsh, seeing his opportunity in Rob's silence, began to speak of himself. He told how his first press-work had been a series of letters he had written when at school, and contributed to a local paper under the signatures of 'Paterfamilias' and 'An Indignant Ratepayer.' Rob scarcely heard. The bare romantic scenery impressed him, and the snow in his face was like a whiff of Thrums. He was dreaming, but not of the reception he might get at the castle, when the clatter of horses awoke him.
'There is a machine behind us,' he said, though he would have written trap.
A brougham lumbered into sight. As its lamps flashed on the pedestrians, the coachman jerked his horses to the side, and Rob had a glimpse of the carriage's occupant. The brougham stopped.
'I beg your pardon,' said the traveller, opening his window, and addressing Rob, 'but in the darkness I mistook you for Colonel Abinger.'
'We are on our way to the castle,' said Walsh, stepping forward.
'Ah, then,' said the stranger, 'perhaps you will give me your company for the short distance we have still to go?'
There was a fine courtesy in his manner that made the reporters feel their own deficiencies, yet Rob thought the stranger repented his offer as soon as it was made. Walsh had his hand on the door, but Rob said—
'We are going to Dome Castle as reporters.'
'Oh!' said the stranger. Then he bowed graciously, and pulled up the window. The carriage rumbled on, leaving the reporters looking at each other. Rob laughed. For the first time in his life the advantage a handsome man has over a plain one had struck him. He had only once seen such a face before, and that was in marble in the Silchester Art Museum. This man looked thirty years of age, but there was not a line on his broad white brow. The face was magnificently classic, from the strong Roman nose to the firm chin. The eyes, too beautiful almost for his sex, were brown and wistful, of the kind that droop in disappointment oftener than they blaze with anger. All the hair on his face was a heavy drooping moustache that almost hid his mouth.
Walsh shook his fist at this insult to the Press.
'It is the baronet I spoke of to you,' he said. 'I forget who he is; indeed, I rather think he travelled incognito when he was here last. I don't understand what he is doing here.'
'Why, I should say this is just the place where he would be if he is to marry Miss Abinger.'
'That was an old story,' said Walsh. 'If there ever was an engagement it was broken off. Besides, if he had been expected we should have known of it at the Argus.'
Walsh was right. Sir Clement Dowton was not expected at Dome Castle, and, like Rob, he was not even certain that he would be welcome. As he drew near his destination his hands fidgeted with the window strap, yet there was an unaccountable twinkle in his eye. Had there been any onlookers they would have been surprised to see that all at once the baronet's sense of humour seemed to overcome his fears, and instead of quaking, he laughed heartily. Sir Clement was evidently one of the men who carry their joke about with them.
This unexpected guest did Rob one good turn. When the colonel saw Sir Clement he hesitated for a moment as if not certain how to greet him. Then the baronet, who was effusive, murmured that he had something to say to him, and Colonel Abinger's face cleared. He did Sir Clement the unusual honour of accompanying him upstairs himself, and so Rob got the seat assigned to him at the dinner-table without having to meet his host in the face. The butler marched him down a long table with a twist in it, and placed him under arrest, as it were, in a chair from which he saw only a few of the company. The dinner had already begun, but the first thing he realised as he took his seat was that there was a lady on each side of him, and a table-napkin in front. He was not sure if he was expected to address the ladies, and he was still less certain about the table-napkin. Of such things he had read, and he had even tried to be prepared for them. Rob looked nervously at the napkin, and then took a covert glance along the table. There was not a napkin in sight except one which a farmer had tied round his neck. Rob's fingers wanted to leave the napkin alone, but by an effort he forced them toward it. All this time his face was a blank, but the internal struggle was sharp. He took hold of the napkin, however, and spread it on his knees. It fell to the floor immediately afterwards, but he disregarded that. It was no longer staring at him from the table, and with a heavy sigh of relief he began to feel more at ease. There is nothing like burying our bogies.
His position prevented Rob's seeing either the colonel at the head of the table or Miss Abinger at the foot of it, and even Walsh was hidden from view. But his right-hand neighbour was a local doctor's wife, whom the colonel had wanted to honour without honouring too much, and she gave him some information. Rob was relieved to hear her address him, and she was interested in a tame Scotsman.
'I was once in the far north myself,' she said, 'as far as Orkney. We were nearly drowned in crossing that dreadful sea between it and the mainland. The Solway Firth, is it?'
Rob thought for a moment of explaining what sea it is, and then he thought, why should he?
'Yes, the Solway Firth,' he said.
'It was rather an undertaking,' she pursued, 'but though we were among the mountains for days, we never encountered any of those robber chieftains one reads about—caterans I think you call them?'
'You were very lucky,'