"

"Gad! I'd give five hundred a year for your appetite and digestion.
Think of that old man, my boy, down in Norfolk at this time of year,
with nobody to swear at but the servants. Norfolk is just endurable
in October, when game and 'longshore herrings are in. But now--with
lamb getting muttony--poor old chap!"

"Well," I answered, "he could not eat me if I was at home. But I'll go
back in the autumn. I generally make it up before the First."

"What a beautiful thing is filial love," murmured my companion, with a
stout sigh, as he turned his attention to the matter of importance on
the plate before him; and indeed--with its handicap of fifty years--I
think his appetite put my hearty craving for food to shame.

We talked of other things for a while--of matters connected with the
gay town in which we found ourselves. We discussed the merits of the
wine before us, and it was not until later in the course of the repast
that John Turner again reverted to my affairs. If these portions of
our talk alone are reported, the reader must kindly remember that they
are at all events relevant to the subject, however unworthy, of this
narrative.

"So," said my stout companion when the coffee was served, "you are
tricking the father so that you may make love to the daughter?"

This view of the matter did not commend itself to my hearing. Indeed,
the truth so often gives offence that it is no wonder so few deal in
it. A quick answer was on my tongue, but fortunately remained there.
I--who had never been too difficult in such matters--did not like
something in my friend's voice that savoured of disrespect towards
Mademoiselle de Clericy. In a younger man I might have been tempted to
allow such a hint to develop into something stronger which would offer
me the satisfaction of throwing the speaker down the stairs. But John
Turner was not a man to quarrel with, even when one was in the wrong.
So I kept silence and burnt my lips at my coffee cup.

"Well," he went on placidly, "Mademoiselle Lucille is a pretty girl."

"Lucille," I said. "Is that her name?"

He cocked his eye at me across the table.

"Yes--a pretty name, eh?"

"It is," I answered him, with steady eyes. "I never heard a
prettier."

Chapter IV

Disqualified

"Rever c'est le bonheur; attendre c'est la vie."

The Vicomte de Clericy's answer was favourable to my suit, and I duly
received permission to install myself in the apartments lately vacated