with a shrug, "and Jasper is Leroy's one vulnerable spot. He will believe nothing against him."
"He's a lucky chap, Vermont," said Standon pensively. "No one really knows what he is or where he springs from; yet he always seems to have plenty of money, and apparently the whole of Leroy's passes through his hands."
"Something near a million," put in Parselle enviously, "and with the run of a castle like a palace. No, Vermont's no fool!"
Mortimer Shelton nodded.
"The Castle's all right," he said curtly. "You can trust the Leroys to have the best of everything. They treat money like dirt, and bow before nothing but Royalty and women. Yet, with it all, there's no stauncher friend than a Leroy."
"As Vermont knows only too well," muttered Standon dryly. "By the way, I saw Ada Lester in the Park this morning. Jove! Such furs!"
"In that quarter Adrien certainly treats his money like dust," said Parselle, with a short laugh. "I can't think what he sees in her; to me she seems an insatiate animal--and about as difficult to satisfy. It's a jolly good job for Leroy that, thanks to his father's generosity, his income runs into five figures--nothing else would stand the strain."
"Do you know, some one told me at the Casket the other night that Leroy had made the theatre over to Ada entirely, and settled a thousand a year on her into the bargain," said Standon, leaning forward.
"I daresay," Mortimer commented dryly. "He's fool enough for anything. The place runs him into eight thousand a year as it is--not including Ada Lester, the lady manager--so he might just as well hand it over to her altogether. I wish to goodness the wretched building would burn down! 'Pon my word, I shall set it alight myself one fine night----"
"Hush! Here he is," said Lord Standon; adding quickly, "with Vermont, of course."
The others looked round towards the new-comers. One was a dark-haired man of about forty years of age. His face was pale, with an almost unhealthy pallor, from which his small dark eyes glittered restlessly; his thin lips, tightly closed, were set in an almost straight line. Clean-shaven, sleek of hair, he wore an expression of cautious slyness that implied a mental attitude ever on guard against some sudden exposure of his real feelings. Such was Jasper Vermont.
His companion was of a different calibre. Still apparently in the early thirties, tall, and with clear-cut aristocratic features, he was decidedly good to look upon. His face, fair as that of a woman, was perhaps slightly marred by the expression of weakness which lurked round the finely-moulded lips; but for all that it was stamped with the latent nobility which characterised his race.
The Hon. Adrien Leroy, only son of Baron Barminster, was one of the most noted figures in fashionable society. His father, who since the death of Lady Barminster had lived almost as a recluse, spent the days in the old Castle, and had practically abdicated in favour of his son. So that the colossal income accruing from the coal mines of Wales, the rentals of the Leroy estates in the Southern Counties, and the ground rents of a considerable acreage in one of the most fashionable parts of London, all passed through the hands of Adrien, who, in his turn, spent it like water, leaving Jasper Vermont--his one-time college friend and now his confidential steward--to watch over his affairs.
Leroy, with a genial smile of greeting for all, but a grave, almost weary expression in his blue eyes, parried the numerous questions and invitations that beset him on all sides, and, taking Vermont's arm, drew him towards the table where his three friends awaited him.
"I'm sorry we're late," he said in a pleasant voice, which was clear and unaffected, in strong contrast to the chatter which buzzed round him at their entry. "Blame Jasper, who, if he is as hungry as I am, is punished already."
His good-humoured laugh as he seated himself drew echoes from his friends; Leroy's popularity was never more apparent than in a gathering of this sort, composed exclusively of his own sex.
"So, have just come up from Barminster," said Shelton presently, "How is the Castle looking?"
Adrien, busily satisfying a vigorous appetite, merely nodded and smiled in reply; but Jasper Vermont answered for him.
"Beautiful!" he said, with a smile which showed his white, even teeth. "Beautiful! It's a charming view; but we saw little of it this visit. Ah, Shelton, you are really an epicure! We don't get clear turtle like this at the Pallodeon--eh, Adrien?"
"No," replied the young man, looking up. "We ought to have Shelton on the committee. No wonder they love you here, Shelton! And so the colt has lost the steeplechase? I saw the news as I came along."
"And you have lost, how much--two thousand?" queried Parselle.
"Five," said Vermont, not quickly, but just before Adrien could speak.
"Is it five?" asked Leroy indifferently. "I thought I'd backed 'Venus' for more."
"I backed her myself for a couple of hundred," put in Lord Standon ruefully. "She's a beautiful creature, though, and I'd like to buy her."
"You can have her, my dear Stan, for a mere song," said Leroy cordially.
"I'm afraid that's impossible," interposed Jasper with suavity. "She's sold."
Adrien looked up in surprise.
"Sold! To whom?" he asked.
"To the knacker," was the calm reply. "Don't you remember, Adrien, that she threw Fording and broke her leg over the last hurdle?"
Leroy's race resumed its usual air of bored indifference.
"Ah, yes, so you told me. My dear Stan, I'm awfully sorry! I had completely forgotten." He looked round the table. "Any of you seen the papers?" he inquired. "Last night was the first of the new comedy at the Casket--how did it go?"
Frank Parselle laughed. "I was there," he admitted. "Ada played finely, but they hissed once or twice."
"Lost on my horse and on my new play. That is bad luck!" exclaimed Adrien, looking, however, very little disturbed by the news. "It must be withdrawn."
"Certainly," agreed Vermont amiably. "Certainly."
"By Jove! what did you tell me the mounting cost?" asked Parselle, addressing Vermont, but glancing significantly at the others.
"Three thousand pounds," answered Vermont glibly, while Adrien ate his fish with the most consummate indifference.
"Three thousand for four nights, that's about it. The public ought to be grateful to you," said Shelton with a tinge of sarcasm in his voice, as he nodded across at Leroy.
Adrien laughed.
"Or I to them," he said cheerfully. "It's no light thing to sit through a bad play. But how is that, Jasper? You said it would run."
"I?" protested Vermont, with a pleasant smile. "No, Adrien, not so certainly as that. I said I thought the play well written, and that in my opinion it ought to run well--a very different thing. Eh, Shelton?"
"Ah!" replied Shelton, who had been watching him keenly. "So you were out in your reckoning for once. It is to be hoped you didn't make the same mistake with the colt. I think you were also favourably inclined to that, weren't you?"
"Yes," admitted Vermont, leaning back with an admirable air of content. "I laid my usual little bet, and lost--of course."
"You should have hedged," said Shelton, who knew as a positive fact that Vermont had done so.
"I have no judgement," Vermont responded deprecatingly. "I am a man of no ideas, and I admit it. Now Adrien is all acuteness; without him I should soon go astray. I am supposed to look after his interests; but, by Jove! it is he who supplies the brains and I the hands. I am the machine--a mere machine, and he turns the handle!" He laughed gently at his own joke, and held up his glass for replenishment.
"A pretty division of labour," commented Shelton, with a faint sneer. "Now we give you the credit for all the tact and business capacity."
"Ah,