The Duke in the Suburbs | Page 5

greenhouse; if you ever want a bloodstain analysed I shall be there."
"Sitting in your dressing-gown, I suppose," said the Duke with awe,
"playing your violin and smoking shag."
Young Mr. Nape frowned.
"Somebody has been talking about me," he said severely.
CHAPTER III
"Sixty--three has to call, 51 is out of town, and 35 has measles in the
house," reported the Duke one morning at breakfast.
Hank helped himself to a fried egg with the flat of his knife.
"What about next door?" he asked.
"Next door won't call," said the Duke sadly. "Next door used to live in
Portland Place, where dukes are so thick you have to fix wire netting to
prevent them coming in at the window--no, mark off 66 as a non -
starter."
Hank ate his egg in silence.
"She's very pretty," he said at length.
"66?"
Hank nodded.

"I saw her yesterday, straight and slim, with a complexion like snow--"
"Cut it out!" said the Duke brutally.
"And eyes as blue as a winter sky in Texas."
"Haw!" murmured his disgusted grace.
"And a walk--" apostrophized the other dreamily.
The Duke raised his hands.
"I surrender, colonel," he pleaded; "you've been patronizing the free
library, I recognize the bit about the sky over little old Texas."
"What happened--?" Hank jerked his head in the direction of No. 66.
The Duke was serious when he replied.
"Africans, Siberians, Old Nevada Silver and all the rotten stock that a
decent, easy-going white man could be lured into buying," he said
quietly; "that was the father. When the smash came he obligingly died."
Hank pursed his lips thoughtfully.
"It's fairly tragic," he said, "poor girl."
The Duke was deep in thought again.
"I must meet her," he said briskly.
Hank looked at the ceiling.
"In a way," he said slowly. "fate has brought you together, and before
the day is over, I've no doubt you will have much to discuss in
common."
The Duke looked at him with suspicion.

"Have you been taking a few private lessons from young Sherlock
Nape?" he asked.
Hank shook his head.
"There was a certain tabby cat that patronized our back garden," he said
mysteriously.
"True, O seer!"
"She ate our flowers."
"She did," said the Duke complacently. "I caught her at it this very
morning."
"And plugged her with an air--gun?"
"Your air--gun," expostulated the Duke hastily.
"Your plug," said Hank calmly; "well, that cat--"
"Don't tell me," said the Duke, rising in his agitation--"don't tell me that
this poor unoffending feline, which your gun--"
"Your shot," murmured Hank.
"Which your wretched air--gun so ruthlessly destroyed," continued the
Duke sternly. "don't tell me it is the faithful dumb friend of 66?"
"It was," corrected Hank.
"The devil it was!" said his grace, subsiding into gloom.
CHAPTER IV
The situation was a tragic one. Alicia Terrill, trembling with
indignation, a faint flush on her pretty face, and her forehead wrinkled
in an angry frown, kept her voice steady with an effort, and looked
down from the step--ladder on which she stood, at the urbane young

man on the other side of the wall.
He stood with his hands respectfully clasped behind his back, balancing
himself on the edge of his tiny lawn, and regarded her without emotion.
The grim evidence of the tragedy was hidden from his view, but he
accepted her estimate of his action with disconcerting calmness. Hank,
discreetly hidden in the conservatory, was an interested eavesdropper.
The girl had time to notice that the Duke had a pleasant face, burnt and
tanned by sun and wind, that he was clean-shaven, with a square
determined jaw and clear grey eyes that were steadfastly fixed on hers.
In a way he was good looking, though she was too angry to observe the
fact, and the loose flannel suit he wore did not hide the athletic
construction of the man beneath.
"It is monstrous of you!" she said hotly, "you, a stranger here--"
"I know your cat," he said calmly.
"And very likely it wasn't poor Tibs at all that ate your wretched
flowers."
"Then poor Tibs isn't hurt," said the Duke with a sigh of relief. "for the
cat I shot at was making a hearty meal of my young chrysanthemums
and--"
"How dare you say that!" she demanded wrathfully. "when the poor
thing is flying round the house with a--with a wounded tail?"
The young man grinned.
"If I've only shot a bit off her tail," he said cheerfully. "I am relieved. I
thought she was down and out."
She was too indignant to make any reply.
"After all," mused the Duke with admirable philosophy. "a tail isn't one
thing or another with a cat--now a horse or a cow needs a tail to keep
the flies away, a dog needs