Lady Drewitt, in a tone suggestive of the great restraint she was exercising over her emotions.
"I hardly like to tell you," he temporised, seeing in his aunt's eyes fear, fear lest he, Richard Beresford, had done anything that would compromise her and the family.
"Richard, I insist on your telling me what has happened."
"I'm going to get married," he said.
"Married!"
What it was that happened Beresford was never quite able to determine; but Lady Drewitt's figure seemed to undergo some strange convulsion, causing her chair to recede at least two inches and she with it. Never had he seen surprise manifest itself so overwhelmingly. She sat staring at him as if he had suddenly changed into a camelopard or a four-winged griffin.
"You see," he began apologetically, "I'm twenty-eight and you are always urging Drew to marry."
"Going to get married!" repeated Lady Drewitt, as if she had not yet properly realised the significance of the words. "Who—who are you going to marry?" Again there was the note of fear in her voice.
"She" he began with simulated hesitation, "she's a girl I met on a gate."
"Met on a what?" almost shouted Lady Drewitt.
"Oh, a gate," he repeated evenly. "A thing that opens and shuts, you know," he added, as if to admit
