"Lord, Sir Christopher," she exclaimed, tapping him with her fan.
"Three days! For shame!"
But though Sir John had started 'twas not in rage. Three days
carousing with this old blockhead! When had he so caroused? He could
have laughed aloud. Never since that time he had left Wildairs, bearing
with him the lock of raven hair--his triumph and his proof. No, 'twas
not in anger he started but through a sudden shock of recollection, of
fierce, eager hope, that at last, in the moment of his impotent
humiliation, he had by chance--by a very miracle of chance--come again
upon what he had so long searched for in helpless rage--that which
would give power into his hand and vengeance of the bitterest.
And he had come upon it among chatterers in a ball-room through the
vinous babbling of a garrulous fool.
"Three days!" he said, and took out his snuff-box and tapped it,
laughing jeeringly. And this strange thing my Lady Betty marked, that
his white hand shook a little as if from hidden excitement. "Three
days!" he mocked.
"No man of fashion now," said Lord Charles, and tapped his snuff-box
also, "is drunk for more than two."
But Sir Christopher felt he was gaining a victory before her ladyship's
very eyes, which always so mocked and teased him for his clumsiness in
any encounter of words, wherefore he pressed his point gleefully.
"Three days!" cries he. "'Twas nearer four.
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