His lordship was just wondering whether, if approached in a softened mood, the other might not disgorge something quite big, when a large, warm raindrop fell on his hand. From the bushes round about came an ever-increasing patter. The sky was leaden.
He looked round him for shelter. He had reached the rose garden in the course of his perambulations. At the far end was a summerhouse. He turned up his coat collar and ran.
As he drew near he heard a slow and dirgelike whistling proceeding from the interior. Plunging in out of breath, just as the deluge began, he found Hargate seated at the little wooden table with an earnest expression on his face. The table was covered with cards. Hargate had not yet been compelled to sprain his wrist, having adopted the alternative of merely refusing invitations to play billiards.
“Halloa, Hargate!” said his lordship. “Isn’t it coming down, by Jove!”
Hargate glanced up, nodded without speaking, and turned his attention to the cards once more. He took one from the pack in his left hand, looked at it, hesitated for a moment, as if doubtful whereabouts on the table it would produce the most artistic effect, and finally put it face upwards. Then he moved another card from the table and put it on top of the other one. Throughout the performance he whistled painfully.
His lordship regarded him with annoyance.
“That looks frightfully exciting,” he said disparagingly. “What are you playing at? Patience?”
Hargate nodded again—this time without looking up.
“Oh, don’t sit there looking like a frog,” said Lord Dreever irritably. “Talk, man.”
Hargate gathered up the cards and proceeded to shuffle them in a meditative manner, whistling the while.
“Oh, stop it!” said his lordship.
Hargate nodded, and stopped.
“Look here,” said Lord Dreever, “this is boring me stiff. Let’s have a game at something—anything to pass away the time. Hang this rain! We shall be cooped up here till dinner at this rate. Ever played piquet? I could teach you in five minutes.”
A look almost of awe came into Hargate’s face—the look of one who sees a miracle performed before his eyes. For years he had been using all the large stock of diplomacy at his command to induce callow youths to play piquet with him, and here was this admirable young man, this pearl among young men, positively offering to teach him the game. It was too much happiness. What had he done to deserve this? He felt as a toil-worn lion might feel if some antelope, instead of making its customary beeline for the horizon, were to trot up and insert its head between his jaws.
“I—I shouldn’t mind being shown the idea,” he said.
He listened attentively while Lord Dreever explained at some length the principles which govern the game of piquet. Every now and then he asked a question. It was evident that he was beginning to grasp the idea of the game.
“What exactly is re-piquing?” he asked, as his lordship paused.
“It’s like this,” said his lordship, returning to his lecture.
“Yes, I see now,” said the neophyte.
They began playing. Lord Dreever, as was only to be expected in a contest between teacher and student, won the first two hands. Hargate won the next.
“I’ve got the hang of it all right now,” he said complacently. “It’s a simple sort of game. Make it more exciting, don’t you think, if we played for something?”
“All right,” said Lord Dreever slowly; “if you like.”
He would not have suggested it himself, but after all, dash it! if the man simply asked for it—It was not his fault if the winning of a hand should have given the fellow the impression that he knew all that there was to be known about piquet. Of course, piquet was a game where skill was practically bound to win. But—After all, Hargate probably had plenty of money. He could afford it.
“All right,” said his lordship again. “How much?”
“Something fairly moderate. Ten bob a hundred?”
There is no doubt that his lordship ought, at this suggestion, to have corrected the novice’s notion that ten shillings a hundred was fairly moderate. He knew that it was possible for a poor player to lose four hundred points in a twenty minutes’ game, and usual for him to lose two hundred. But he let the thing go.
“Very well,” he said.
Twenty minutes later Hargate was looking somewhat ruefully at the score-sheet. “I owe you eighteen shillings,” he said. “Shall I pay you now, or shall we settle up in a lump after we’ve finished?”
“What about stopping now?” said Lord Dreever. “It’s quite fine out.”
“No; let’s go on. I’ve nothing to do till dinner, and I don’t suppose you have.”
His lordship’s conscience made one last effort.
“You’d much better stop, you know, Hargate, really,” he said. “You can lose a frightful lot at this game.”
“My dear Dreever,” said Hargate stiffly, “I can look after myself, thanks. Of course, if you think you are risking too much, by all means—”
“Oh, if you don’t mind,” said his lordship, outraged, “I’m only too frightfully pleased. Only remember I warned you.”
“I’ll bear it in mind. By the way, before we start, care to make it a sovereign a hundred?”
Lord Dreever could not afford to play piquet for a sovereign a hundred, or, indeed, to play piquet for money at all; but after his adversary’s innuendo it was impossible for a young gentleman of spirit to admit the humiliating fact. He nodded.
“About time, I fancy,” said Hargate, looking at his watch an hour later, “that we were going in to dress for dinner.”
His lordship made no reply. He was wrapped in thought.
“Let’s see, that’s twenty pounds you owe me, isn’t it?” continued Hargate. “Shocking bad luck you had.”
They went out into the rose garden.
“Jolly everything smells after the rain,” said Hargate, who seemed to have struck a conversational patch. “Freshened everything up.”
His lordship did not appear to have noticed
