'You see,' said he, 'people do make such
mistakes about a man's feelings.'
'Lord Silverbridge!'
'It's quite true, but I'll tell you about it another time,' and so
he left her. All these little troubles, his experience in the
'House', the necessity of snubbing Tifto, the choice of a wife,
and his battle with Reginald Dobbes, were giving him by degrees
age and flavour.
Lady Mabel had fluttered about him on his first coming, and had
been very gracious, doing the part of an old friend. 'There is to
be a big shooting tomorrow,' she said, in the presence of Mrs
Jones.
'If it is to come to that,' he said, 'I might as well go back to
Dobbydom.'
'You may shoot if you like,' said Mabel.
'I haven't even brought a gun with me.'
'Then we'll have a walk,--a whole lot of us,' she said.
In the evening about an hour before dinner Silverbridge and Lady
Mabel were seated together on the bank of a little stream which
ran on the other side of the road, but on a spot not more than a
furlong from the hall-door. She had brought him there, but she had
done so without any definite scheme.
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