Chapter 23 - Page 2

his cold face held
it. One of his marked suggestions was that there was unusual lack of
revelation in his rather fine almond eye. It might have revealed much
but its intention was to reveal nothing but courteous detachment from
all but well-bred approach to the demand of the present moment.

"I think I remember seeing you when you were a boy, Lord Coombe," the
Vicar said. "My father was rector of St. Andrews." St. Andrews was the
Norman-towered church on the edge of the park enclosing Coombe Keep.

"I came to you because I also remembered that," was Coombe's reply.

Their meeting was a very quiet one. But every incident of life was
quiet in the Vicarage. Only low sounds were ever heard, only almost
soundless movements made. The two men seated themselves and talked
calmly while the rain pattered on the window panes and streaming down
them seemed to shut out the world.

What the Vicar realised was that, since his visitor had announced that
he had come because he remembered their old though slight acquaintance,
he had obviously come for some purpose to which the connection formed a
sort of support or background. This man, whose modernity of bearing and
externals seemed to separate them by a lifetime of experience, clearly
belonged to the London which surrounded and enclosed his own silences
with civilised roar and the tumult of swift passings. On the surface the
small, dingy book-crammed study obviously held nothing this outer world
could require. The Vicar said as much courteously and he glanced round
the room as he spoke, gently smiling.

"But it is exactly this which brings me," Lord Coombe answered.

With great clearness and never raising the note of quiet to which the
walls were accustomed, he made his explanation. He related no incidents
and entered into no detail. When he had at length concluded the
presentation of his desires, his hearer knew nothing whatever, save what
was absolutely necessary, of those concerned in the matter. Utterly
detached from all curiosities as he was, this crossed the Vicar's mind.
There was a marriage ceremony to be performed. That only the contracting
parties should be aware of its performance was absolutely necessary.
That there should be no chance of opportunity given for question or
comment was imperative. Apart from this the legality of the contract was
all that concerned those entering into it; and that must be assured
beyond shadow of possible doubt.

In the half-hidden and forgotten old church to which the Vicarage was
attached such a ceremony could obviously be performed, and to an
incumbent detached from the outer world, as it were, and one who was
capable of comprehending the occasional gravity of