Priscilla stopped. The eager excitement of Frank’s tone surprised her.
“Why?” she asked. “It’s only father and that Lord of his. We’ve got to face them some time or other. We may as well get it over at once.”
“That’s the beast who shoved me over the steamer’s gangway,” said Frank, “and sprained my ankle.”
Sir Lucius and Lord Torrington turned at the end of the lawn and began to walk towards Priscilla and Frank.
“Now I can see his face,” said Priscilla, “I don’t wonder at your rather loathing him. I think you were jolly lucky to get off with a sprained ankle. A man with a nose like that would break your arm or stab you in the back.”
Lord Torrington’s nose was fleshy, pitted in places, and of a purple colour.
“Curious taste the King must have,” said Priscilla, “to make a man like that a Marquis. You’d expect he’d choose out fairly good-looking people. But, of course, you can’t really tell about kings. I daresay they have to do quite a lot of things they don’t really like, on account of being constitutional. Rather poor sport being constitutional, I should say; for the King that is. It’s pleasanter, of course, for the other people.”
Frank knew that the present King was blameless in the matter of Lord Torrington’s marquisate. It was inherited from a great-grandfather, who may have had an ordinary, possibly even a beautiful nose. But he attempted no explanation. His anxiety made him disinclined for a discussion of the advantages of having an hereditary aristocracy.
“If he is the man who sprained your ankle,” she said, “it’s far better for you to have it out with him now when I’m here to back you up. If you put it off till dinner time you’ll have to tackle him alone. I’m sure not to be let in. Anyhow, we can’t go back now. They’ve seen us.”
Lord Torrington and Sir Lucius approached them. Frank plucked nervously at his tie, unbuttoned and then re-buttoned his coat. He felt that he had been entirely blameless during the scrimmage on the gangway of the steamer, but Lord Torrington did not look like a man who would readily own himself to be in the wrong.
“Your daughter, Lentaigne?” said Lord Torrington. “H’m, fifteen, you said; looks less. Shake hands, little girl.”
Priscilla put out her right hand demurely. Her eyes were fixed on the ground. Her lips were slightly parted in a deprecating smile, suggestive of timid modesty.