"Better!" he groaned, "why the day you let that Bibby woman loose on me I was a flowing river compared to my mood to-day."
At that a recollection evidently came over Kate, some memory that the unexpected arrival had driven away, for she froze visibly.
"I will go and make you a lemon-squash," she said coldly; "you are possibly thirsty."
"Thirsty!" said Hugh, "my outward and visible dust is nothing to what I"ve swallowed! Make me six lemon-squashes. But what"s the matter, Kit?"
She made no answer, merely turned one severe glance on him and went off to the pantry.
"Do tell me, Kate," he said, after he had lowered the large jugful she brought him, and still she had made no further remark. "Nothing"s happened to the bike, has it? You"ve not smashed your precious nose? No, it seems intact. Has the low-spirited Ellen given notice? Has Octavius been charging more than elevenpence for his bacon?"
But Kate preserved a stony silence; she even picked up her book again and affected to read. He drew the volume out of her hands.
"I pray thee, Rosalind, sweet my coz, be merry."
"I don"t feel as if I could ever be merry again with you, Hugh," she said.
"And here have I," he said, addressing the verandah ceiling, "pa.s.sed through dangers enough to make me loved, Oth.e.l.lo-wise, for themselves alone. Dangers of culverts, dangers of sharp turnings, dangers of blue metal, of precipices, of wandering cows, of naphtha explosions. Here have I turned myself into a demd damp moist unpleasant body just to get to her sheltering bosom and she repulses me like this."
"It is because I am what I have never been before, Hugh," said Kate, "and that is ashamed of you."
"Ashamed? Of me, my joy!" said Hugh, but he knew now that it was the interview outrage that was disturbing Kate. "It knows it is talking demd charming sweetness but naughty fibs. It knows it is not ashamed of its own popolorum tibby."
"Which is entirely attributable," said Kate, unable to resist keeping up the vein, "to the gross misconduct and most improper behaviour of Mr.
Mantalini."
"Of me, my essential juice of pineapple!"
"Of you, Sir!"
"Will she call me, Sir!" cried Hugh, "me who doat upon her with the demdest ardour! She, who coils her fascination round me like a pure and angelic rattlesnake! It will be all up with my feelings; she will throw me into a demd state."
"Hugh," said Kate, "it is far too serious a matter for nonsense. I consider it was not only unkind but unmanly."
"My cup of happiness"s sweetener," said Hugh, as he took out his pipe and his tobacco and his matches with much deliberation. "You brought it upon her yourself and she has _you_ to blame." He filled his pipe with tobacco and rammed it well in. "It will be a lesson to you"--he struck a match--"and I trust to her"--he tilted his chair back and puffed once or twice--"to let an inoffensive man go on his way unmolested. And now my sweet Rose, my dear Rose, be merry."
"But you might have given her the lesson privately," persisted Kate, and her eyes kindled. "The unmanly part comes in when you callously allow her to become the laughing-stock of town."
"What!" thundered Hugh, and he brought his chair so suddenly and heavily back to its four-legged condition that the frail thing responded with an ominous creak. "What on earth do you mean?"
"Didn"t you know she was going to sign the interview with her own name?"
asked Kate, glad to find there might be some extenuating circ.u.mstances.
"You don"t mean seriously to tell me she"s gone and published that fool of an interview?" Hugh shouted.
"I do seriously so mean," said Kate.
"Go and get me the paper," he said.
Kate brought him the _Evening Mail_ of two days back.
And there in black headlines he read--
"The only interview Hugh Kinross has ever granted."
"A lady beards the lion in his den and extracts most interesting particulars."
"The eccentricities of a great author."
When Agnes Bibby"s neat MS. had reached the Editor of the _Evening Mail_ that gentleman had fairly shouted with laughter, for he knew Kinross and his habits well. And this perfervid and most serious account was in truth very funny.
He found himself quite unable to resist so unique an opportunity of raising a roar of laughter among his readers. Therefore, telling himself that Kinross had too much humour to be seriously annoyed, and holding himself protected by the well-known signature authenticating it, he had at once blue-pencilled the article and sent it precisely as it stood into the hands of the foreman printer. His twinkling eye had practically swept over without noticing the modest signature at the end of the article, "Agnes Bibby (Burunda)." Else, for the sake of Thomas downstairs, if not for the lady herself, he would have scored it through and let the laugh go against an anonymous contributor.
But things move rapidly in the office of an evening paper, and the foreman ran through the first proofs and the sub-editor through the second, and neither thought of removing that poor little name at the end.
And now the article was two days old and quite famous. There had not been a copy left of any of the editions.
"Well, well," said Hugh as he seized the paper, and ran his eye over the paragraphs concerning his collar habit and his shoe habit, and his ante-prandial energy,--"the laugh"s only up against myself, and I"m not thin-skinned." Then he saw the signature at the end, "Agnes Bibby (Burunda)," in large, clear type.
"By George!" he said; "by George, Kate! That"s rough on her." He breathed hard. "Do you think she has seen it yet?"
"Seen it!" said Kate, and her voice actually choked a little. "The poor girl is breaking her heart over it. I have never known any one feel anything so acutely. Of course she must have realized it was all a joke the moment she read the Editor"s facetious comments. And then it seems she has a brother in the office, and he has written to her a brotherly letter explaining elaborately how she is the laughing-stock of the whole town."
"By Jove!" repeated Hugh; "by Jove!" He seemed quite stunned. "Have you seen her yet, K? Does she seem at all cut up?"
"Seen her!" repeated Kate, her mouth a-tremble with sympathy. "Yes, I went over at once, and she saw me coming and ran this way and then that to get away from me. And when she couldn"t she just dropped down against the bank on the lawn and sobbed and cried as heartbrokenly as m.u.f.fie might have done."
"I say!" said Hugh. He gulped a lump from his throat. "I say!"
Then he turned on his heel and strode through the cottage and over the verandah and through the "Tenby" garden and across the road and away down "Greenways" drive.
"Bless the boy!" said Kate, wiping her eyes. "I know he didn"t mean to hurt the poor thing."
CHAPTER XIII
AN INTERVIEW WITH THE INTERVIEWER
He could hardly wait to ring the bell; the front door was open and seemed to suggest that he should stride in and march directly to the room from which children"s voices were coming and where the victim of his brutality most likely also was sitting.
But he thought better of such behaviour and loudly rang the bell.
Anna came down the hall, evidently trying to restrain a giggle at his dusty appearance.
"Is Miss Bibby in?" he demanded sternly.