And there were no dukes on the horizon.Merthshire had married almost at once, and all the others were too young or had wives already.If this man would take her, she might feel herself lucky.Temple Barholm and seventy thousand a year were not to be trifled with by a girl who had made herself unpopular and who was twenty-six.And for her own luck the moment had come just before it was too late--a second marriage, wealth, the end of the hideous struggle.Joan was the obstacle in her path, and she must be forced out of it.She glanced quickly at Tembarom.He was trying to talk to Joan now.He was trying to please her.She evidently had a fascination for him.He looked at her in a curious way when she was not looking at him.It was a way different from that of other men whom she had watched as they furtively stared.It had struck her that he could not take his eyes away.That was because he had never before been on speaking terms with a woman of beauty and rank.
Joan herself knew that he was trying to please her, and she was asking herself how long he would have the courage and presumption to keep it up.He could scarcely be enjoying it.
He was not enjoying it, but he kept it up.He wanted to be friends with her for more reasons than one.No one had ever remained long at enmity with him.He had "got over" a good many people in the course of his career, as he had "got over" Joseph Hutchinson.This had always been accomplished because he presented no surface at which arrows could be thrown.She was the hardest proposition he had ever come up against, he was thinking; but if he didn't let himself be fool enough to break loose and get mad, she'd not hate him so much after a while.
She would begin to understand that it wasn't his fault; then perhaps he could get her to make friends.In fact, if she had been able to read his thoughts, there is no certainty as to how far her temper might have carried her.But she could see him only as a sharp-faced, common American of the shop-boy class, sitting at the head of Jem Temple Barholm's table, in his chair.
As they passed through the hall to go to the drawing-room after the meal was over, she saw a neat, pale young man speaking to Burrill and heard a few of his rather anxiously uttered words.
"The orders were that he was always to be told when Mr.Strangeways was like this, under all circumstances.I can't quiet him, Mr.
Burrill.He says he must see him at once."
Burrill walked back stiffly to the dining-room.
"It won't trouble HIM much to be disturbed at his wine," he muttered before going."He doesn't know hock from port."When the message was delivered to him, Tembarom excused himself with simple lack of ceremony.
"I 'll be back directly," he said to Palliser."Those are good cigars." And he left the room without going into the matter further.
Palliser took one of the good cigars, and in taking it exchanged a glance with Burrill which distantly conveyed the suggestion that perhaps he had better remain for a moment or so.Captain Palliser's knowledge of interesting detail was obtained "by chance here and there," he sometimes explained, but it was always obtained with a light and casual air.
"I am not sure," he remarked as he took the light Burrill held for him and touched the end of his cigar--"I am not quite sure that I know exactly who Mr.Strangeways is.""He's the gentleman, sir, that Mr.Temple Barholm brought over from New York," replied Burrill with a stolidity clearly expressive of distaste.
"Indeed, from New York! Why doesn't one see him?""He's not in a condition to see people, sir," said Burrill, and Palliser's slightly lifted eyebrow seeming to express a good deal, he added a sentence, "He's not all there, sir.""From New York, and not all there.What seems to be the matter?"Palliser asked quietly."Odd idea to bring a lunatic all the way from America.There must be asylums there.""Us servants have orders to keep out of the way," Burrill said with sterner stolidity."He's so nervous that the sight of strangers does him harm.I may say that questions are not encouraged.""Then I must not ask any more," said Captain Palliser."I did not know I was edging on to a mystery.""I wasn't aware that I was myself, sir," Burrill remarked, "until Iasked something quite ordinary of Pearson, who is Mr.Temple Barholm's valet, and it was not what he said, but what he didn't, that showed me where I stood.""A mystery is an interesting thing to have in a house," said Captain Palliser without enthusiasm.He smoked his cigar as though he was enjoying its aroma, and even from his first remark he had managed not to seem to be really quite addressing himself to Burrill.He was certainly not talking to him in the ordinary way; his air was rather that of a gentleman overhearing casual remarks in which he was only vaguely interested.Before Burrill left the room, however, and he left it under the impression that he had said no more than civility demanded, Captain Palliser had reached the point of being able to deduce a number of things from what he, like Pearson, had not said.