Page:The Outcry (London, Methuen & Co., 1911).djvu/20

6 sharpness among possible claims on his attention. "I luckily find you at least, Lady Sandgate—they tell me Theign's off somewhere."

She replied as with the general habit, on her side, of bland reassurance; it mostly had easier consequences—for herself—than the perhaps more showy creation of alarm. "Only off in the park—open to-day for a school-feast from Dedborough, as you may have made out from the avenue; giving good advice, at the top of his lungs, to four hundred and fifty children."

It was such a scene, and such an aspect of the personage so accounted for, as Lord John could easily take in, and his recognition familiarly smiled. "Oh, he's so great on such occasions that I'm sorry to be missing it."

"I've had to miss it," Lady Sandgate sighed—"that is to miss the peroration. I've just left them; but he had even then been going on for twenty minutes; and I dare say that if you care to take a look you'll find him, poor dear victim of duty, still at it."

"I'll warrant—for, as I often tell him, he