There were cigar boxes on the fine old oak mantel, out in the hall, and Winnie indicated them to him with the obvious suggestion that he was expected to smoke. He looked her over as he lit his cigar--where she stood spreading her hands above the blaze of the logs, and concluded that she was much nicer upon acquaintance than he had thought. Her slight figure might not be beautiful, but beyond doubt its lines were ladylike. The same extenuating word applied itself in his mind to her thin and swarthy, though distinguished, features. They bore the stamp of caste, and so did the way she looked at one through her eye-glasses, from under those over-heavy black eyebrows, holding her head a little to one side. Though it was easy enough to guess that she had a spirit of her own, her gentle, almost anxious, deference to her mother had shown that she had it under admirable control.
He had read about her in a peerage at his sister's book-shop the previous day. Unfortunately it did not give her age, but that was not so important, after all. She was styled Honourable. She was the daughter of one Viscount and the sister of another. Her grandfather had been an Earl, and the book had shown her to possess a bewildering number of relationships among titled folks. All this was very interesting to him--and somewhat suggestive. Vague, shapeless hints at projects rose in his brain as he looked at her.
“I'm afraid you think my brother has odd notions of entertaining his guests,” she remarked to him, over her shoulder. The other ladies had not joined them.
“Oh, I'm all right,” he protested cordially. “I should hate to have him put himself out in the slightest.” Upon consideration he added: “I suppose he has given up the idea of shooting to-day.”
“I think not,” she answered.” The keeper was about this morning, that is--and he doesn't often come unless they are to go out with the guns. I suppose you are very fond of shooting.”
“Well--I've done some--in my time,” Thorpe replied, cautiously. It did not seem necessary to explain that he had yet to fire his first gun on English soil. “It's a good many years,” he went on, “since I had the time and opportunity to do much at it. I think the last shooting I did was alligators. You hit 'em in the eye, you know. But what kind of a hand I shall make of it with a shot-gun, I haven't the least idea. Is the shooting round I here pretty good?”