If I might explain, it was that,
sir--its being done under circumstances and in a certain entirely
genial spirit of irritation to which I could take no offence, sir. His
lordship is a very decent sort, sir. I've known him intimately for
years."
"Dear, dear!" he replied. "Too bad, too bad! And I dare say you
thought me out of temper last night? Nothing of the sort. You should
have taken it in quite the same spirit as you did from Lord Ivor
Cradleigh."
"It seemed different, sir," I said firmly. "If I may take the liberty
of putting it so, I felt quite offended by your manner. I missed from
it at the most critical moment, as one might say, a certain urbanity
that I found in his lordship, sir."
"Well, well, well! It's too bad, really. I'm quite aware that I show a
sort of brusqueness at times, but mind you, it's all on the surface.
Had you known me as long as you've known his lordship, I dare say
you'd have noticed the same rough urbanity in me as well. I rather
fancy some of us over here don't do those things so very differently.
A few of us, at least."
"I'm glad, indeed, to hear it, sir. It's only necessary to understand
that there is a certain mood in which one really cannot permit one's
self to be--you perceive, I trust."
"Perfectly, perfectly," said he, "and I can only express my regret
that you should have mistaken my own mood, which, I am confident, was
exactly the thing his lordship might have felt.
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