You are getting into one of your tempers." Sir Charles looked about him.

Erskine had discreetly slipped away, and was in the road, tightening a screw in his bicycle.

The few persons who remained were out of earshot.
"Who and what the devil is he, and how do you come to know him ?" he demanded.

He never swore in the presence of any lady except his wife, and then only when they were alone.
"He is a gentleman, which is more than you are," she retorted, and, with a cut of her whip that narrowly missed her husband's shoulder, sent the bay plunging through the gap.
"Come along," she said to Erskine.

"We shall be late for luncheon." "Had we not better wait for Sir Charles ?" he asked injudiciously.
"Never mind Sir Charles, he is in the sulks," she said, without abating her voice.