He was a hardened sinner, but he could not face Mrs.Welman.
It was, however, plainly impossible to confine the secret so strictly as to prevent it coming to the knowledge of Lord Rickmansworth.

Indeed he had a right to know the issue, for he had been a sharer in the design; and accordingly, when he also left Baden and betook himself to his own house to spend what was left of the autumn, he carried locked in his heart the news of the fresh development.

On the whole he observed the injunction of silence urgently laid upon him by Ayre with tolerable faithfulness.

But there are limits to these things, and it never entered Rickmansworth's head that his sister was included among the persons who were to remain in ignorance till the matter was finally settled.

He met Claudia at the family reunion at Territon Park in the beginning of October, and when she and he and Bob were comfortably seated at dinner together, among the first remarks he made--indeed, he was brimming over with it--was: "I suppose you've heard the news, Clau ?" What with one thing--packing and unpacking, traveling, perhaps less obvious troubles--Lady Claudia was in a state which, if it manifested itself in a less attractive person, might be called snappish.
"I never hear any news," she answered shortly.
"Well, here's some for you," replied the Earl, grinning.