To say nothing of finding out what was so obviously worrying his brother.
The day was not yet quite over, though. Richard, who had proved to be Lacey’s much older half-brother, met Cousin George’s party in the entrance hall of his Park Lane home where he had arranged for a late tea to be served to them. He was leaving to keep yet another appointment, he said, and apologised for not being able to entertain them in person.
‘Sorry I couldn’t go with you this afternoon,’ he announced cheerfully. ‘Duty and all that. George, here, being a civil servant, can call his pleasure, duty, but a simple business chap like myself hasn’t that option—as you can now see.’
Simple, he called himself—simple, he certainly wasn’t, Jack thought. Lacey introduced him to Jack, although Jack thought that he had almost certainly met Richard years ago, before the war.
‘Fighting Jack, isn’t it?’ he remarked cordially. ‘We met at Ascot in ‘13, I think. Squiring young Miss, were you? Come to dinner tonight as a thank-you, you deserve it.’ This was all said with the greatest good humour.
Jack accepted the invitation to dinner, even though he had packed his evening wear before he had left for the lawyers that morning and would now have to unpack it. It would give him yet another chance to meet Lacey and take a last memory of her home to Sussex.
‘Though I don’t think that I really deserve a thank you,’ he ended, ‘it was a most enjoyable afternoon.’
Lacey murmured, her eyes twinkling mischief, ‘I think that Jack enjoyed himself on the roller coaster as much as I did.’
‘I’m sure he did,’ smiled Richard, looking knowing.
Later that evening, before the guests arrived for dinner, he remarked to Lacey, to Aunt Sue’s annoyance, ‘Young Compton’s better than your average escort. He had a good war and gave up a promising career in the Army in order to try to improve the family fortunes. His brother Will is a helpless cripple—war wounds, of course. The other brother was killed at Passchendaele.’
‘I know,’ Lacey said simply. ‘He’s not at all like his cousin Rupert or any of the other young men I have met over here. He takes life seriously.’
One thing she had already privately decided: that London season or no London season, she would be off to Sussex as soon as decently possible!
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