Page:The Outcry (London, Methuen & Co., 1911).djvu/283

Rh Her invoked authority, however, in answer to this, made but a motion of disappointment and disgust at so much rank folly—while Lord Theign, on the other hand, followed up his happy thought. "Then if it's Bender's show, or if he claims it is, there's all the more reason!" And it took his lordship's inspiration no longer to flower. "See here, John—do this: go right round there this moment, please, and tell them from me to shut straight down!"

"'Shut straight down'?" the young man abhorrently echoed.

"Stop it to-night—wind it up and end it: see?" The more the entertainer of that vision held it there the more charm it clearly took on for him. "Have the picture removed from view and the incident closed."

"You seriously ask that of me!" poor Lord John quavered.

"Why in the world shouldn't I? It's a jolly lot less than you asked of me a month ago at Dedborough."

"What then am I to say to them?" Lord John spoke but after a very long moment, during which he had only looked hard and—