"No--sit still," Thorpe bade him, and then, with chin settled more determinedly than ever in his cravat, sat eyeing him in a long, dour silence.
Lord Plowden found it impossible to obtain from this massive, apathetic visage any clue to the thoughts working behind it.
He chanced to recall the time when he had discussed with Thorpe the meaning and values of this inscrutable expression which the latter's countenance could assume.
It had seemed interesting and even admirable to him then--but then he had not foreseen the possibility that he himself might some day confront its adamantine barrier with a sinking heart. All at once he could bear this implacable sphinx-gaze no longer.
"I'm sure some other day would be better," he urged, with an open overture to propitiation in his tone.
"You're not in the mood to be bothered with my affairs today.""As much today as any other," Thorpe answered him, slowly.
The other sat suddenly upright--and then upon a moment's reflection rose to his feet. "I don't in the least know what to make of all this," he said, with nervous precipitancy.
"If I've offended you in any way, say so, and I will apologize at once. But treatment of this sort passes my comprehension."Thorpe in truth did not himself comprehend it much more clearly. Some strange freak of wilfulness impelled him to pursue this unintelligible persecution.
"I've said nothing about any offense," he declared, in a hard, deliberate voice. "It is your own word.
All the same--I mention the name of a lady--a lady, mind you, whom I met under your own roof--and you strike attitudes and put on airs as if--as if I wasn't good enough!""Oh, upon my word, that's all rubbish!" the other broke in.
"Nothing could have been further from my thoughts, I assure you. Quite naturally I was surprised for the moment at a bit of unexpected news--but that was all.
I give you my word that was all."
"Very well, then," Thorpe consented grudgingly to mutter.
He continued his sullen scrutiny of the man standing before him, noting how the vivacity of his bearing had deteriorated in these few minutes. He had cut such a gallant figure when he entered the room, with his sparkling eye and smile, his almost jaunty manner, his superior tailor's plumage--and now he was such a crestfallen and wilted thing!
Remembering their last conversation together--remembering indeed how full of liking for this young nobleman he had been when they last met--Thorpe paused to wonder at the fact that he felt no atom of pity for him now.
What was his grievance? What had Plowden done to provoke this savage hostility? Thorpe could not tell. He knew only that unnamed forces dragged him forward to hurt and humiliate his former friend. Obscurely, no doubt, there was something about a woman in it. Plowden had been an admirer of Lady Cressage. There was her father's word for it that if there had been money enough he would have wished to marry her. There had been, as well, the General's hint that if the difficulty of Plowden's poverty were removed, he might still wish to marry her--a hint which Thorpe discovered to be rankling with a sudden new soreness in his mind. Was that why he hated Plowden? No--he said to himself that it was not.
He was going to marry Lady Cressage himself. Her letter, signifying delicately her assent to his proposal, had come to him that very morning--was in his pocket now.
What did he care about the bye-gone aspirations of other would-be suitors? And, as for Plowden, he had not even known of her return to London. Clearly there remained no communications of any sort between them.
It was not at all on her account, he assured himself, that he had turned against Plowden. But what other reason could there be? He observed his visitor's perturbed and dejected mien with a grim kind of satisfaction--but still he could not tell why.
"This is all terribly important to me," the nobleman said, breaking the unpleasant silence. His voice was surcharged with earnestness. "Apparently you are annoyed with something--what it may be I can't for the life of me make out.
All I can say is"--and he broke off with a helpless gesture which seemed to imply that he feared to say anything.
Thorpe put out his lips. "I don't know what you mean,"he said, brusquely.
"What I mean"--the other echoed, with bewildered vagueness of glance. "I'm all at sea. I don't in the least grasp the meaning of anything. You yourself volunteered the declaration that you would do great things for me.
'We are rich men together'--those were your own words.
I urged you at the time to go slowly--to consider carefully whether you weren't being too generous. I myself said to you that you were ridiculously exaggerating what you called your obligation to me. It was you who insisted upon presenting me with 100,000 shares.""Well, they are here ready for you," said Thorpe, with calculated coldness. "You can have them whenever you please. I promised them to you, and set them aside for you. You can take them away with you now, if you like. What are you kicking up this fuss for, then? Upon my word!--you come here and suggest to me that I made promises to you which I've broken!"Plowden looked hard at him, as he turned over in his mind the purport of these words. "I see what you are doing,"he said then. "You turn over to me 100,000 vendor's deferred shares. Thanks! I have already 1,000 of them.
I keep them in the same box with my father's Confederate bonds.""What the hell do you mean?" Thorpe broke in with explosive warmth, lifting himself in his chair.
"Oh, come now, Thorpe," Plowden retorted, "let's get this talk on an intelligent, common-sense footing."He had regained something of his self-control, and keenly put forward now to help him all his persuasive graces of eye and speech. He seated himself once more.
"I'm convinced that you want to be good to me.
Of course you do! If I've seemed here for a minute or two to think otherwise, it was because I misunderstood things.
