The servant knew him to be the proprietor of a newspaper; and, like his betters (including some of the highest personages in the land) the footman was afraid of the Press.
Sir John administered his first dose of advice. 'Sit down, my good fellow -- take a cigar -- and out with it!'
Cyril told his melancholy story. 'She treats me cruelly,' he said, by way of conclusion. 'And I assure you, on my word of honour, I haven't observed it.'
Sir John administered the second dose. 'Exactly my case,' he remarked coolly. 'I am devoted to the loveliest girl in the world, and she treats me cruelly. Would you believe it? -- she has left London to avoid me, and I don't know where to find her. Do as I do: take it easy.'
'I'm too fond of her, Sir John, to take it easy.'
'Oh, if you come to that, I'm broken-hearted. At the same time, I don't disguise from myself that we are both rowing in the same boat. You're the favourite plaything of one coquette; and I the favourite plaything of another. There it is in a nutshell.'
This off-hand way of speaking of the beloved object shocked Cyril. 'You may be right about your lady,' he answered. 'Excuse me for saying that you are wrong about mine.'
Sir John laughed. 'I was as innocent once as you are,' he said. 'Let's get at the facts first. Mine is quite a young one. Is yours quite a young one too?'
'In the first lovely bloom of youth!'
'You curious boy! Your imagination is misleading you -- and you don't know it. All girls are alike.'
Cyril indignantly struck his fist on the table. 'There isn't another girl in the world like my Mabel!'
Sir John suddenly became serious.
'Mabel?' he repeated. 'There's something in that name which sounds familiar to me. Not the niece of Major Evergreen, surely?'
'Yes!' cried simple Cyril, 'the same. How stupid of me not to have thought of it before! She has met you in society; and she is naturally interested in a celebrated man like yourself.You would have some influence over her. Oh, Sir John, if you would only see Mabel, and say a word to her in my interests, how truly obliged to you I should be!'
The impenetrable face of the man of the world expressed nothing but perfect readiness to make himself useful. Far more experienced eyes than Cyril's would have discovered nothing in Sir John Bosworth's manner even remotely suggesting that the two lovers had been, all this time, talking of the same lady.
'With pleasure!' cried Sir John. 'But where shall we find her?'
Cyril seized his hand. 'You good friend!' he exclaimed, with tears in his eyes. 'She's staying with my mother at our house -- only a short ride from this place. When will you let me introduce you to my mother?'
'Whenever you like.'
'At once?'
And that excellent man smiled, and cheerfully echoed the words: 'At once!'
IV The two gentlemen discovered Miss Mabel walking up and down the garden terrace in front of Oakapple Hall, reading a book. Good girl! It was a volume of her uncle's poetry.
'I felt sure you would be glad to meet Sir John Bosworth again,' Cyril began.
His manner was a great deal too humble. Before he could get any farther, Sir John spoke for himself.
'The happiness is all mine,' he said in his easy way. 'If I happen, however, to be intruding, pray don't scruple to say so.'
Mabel raised her eyes from her book. She had only to look at Cyril, and to see what had happened. Angry, perplexed, flattered, amused -- in this conflict of small emotions she was completely at a loss how to assert herself to the best advantage; and she took refuge in a cold composure which, for the time being at least, committed her to nothing. 'I was certainly engaged in reading,' she replied -- and put a mark in her book with a sigh of resignation.
Impenetrable Sir John received the blow without flinching. 'You led me to hope for the honour of being introduced to Mrs Corydon,' he said to Cyril. 'Shall we find her at home?'
He took Cyril's arm and led him to the house. 'That's the way to manage her,' he whispered. 'I'll bet you five to one she's vexed at our leaving her -- and ten to one that she receives us more civilly when she sees us again. Don't look back! You're a lost man if she discovers that you're thinking of her. Which is the way to the drawing-room?'
Sir John Bosworth effected the conquest of Mrs Corydon at the first interview. She treated him as she was accustomed to treat her best friends. In other words, she offered to show him over the house. Oakapple Hall was a place of great age and celebrity. In the upper regions two Kings of England had slept, and the ground floor still showed traces of the passage of Oliver Cromwell and his men. Sir John made his excuses for that day. Having heard that Mabel's uncle was in the house, he was courteously unwilling to disturb the major in the agonies of poetical composition. When he had taken his leave he whispered to Cyril, on his way to the house door: 'I'll lay you another wager, if you like -- we shall see Miss Mabel still on the terrace.' And they did see her.
She was seated, with her closed book on her lap, deep in thought.