Part 10 (1/2)

She made a little pouting motion at him with her lips. ”Marko, I wish to goodness you wouldn't call me Lady Tybar. Dash it, we've called one another Nona and Marko for about a thousand years, long before I ever knew Tony. And just because I'm married--”

”And to a mere loathsome bloodsucker, too,” Lord Tybar interposed.

”Yes, especially to a bloodsucker. Just remember to say Nona, will you, otherwise there'll be a cruel scene between us. I told you about it before I went away. You don't suppose Tony minds, do you?”

”And Sabre,” said Lord Tybar, ”what the devil does it matter what a bloated robber minds, anyway? That's the way to look at me, Sabre.

Trample me underfoot, my boy. I'm a pestilent survivor of the feudal system, aren't I, Nona?”

”Absolutely. So, Marko, don't be a completer noodle than you already are.”

”Ah, you're getting it now.” Lord Tybar murmured. ”I'm a noodle, too, the _Searchlight_ says.”

He somehow gave Sabre the impression of taking an even deeper enjoyment in the incident between his wife and Sabre than the enjoyment he clearly had in his own facetiousness. He was slightly turned in his saddle so as to look directly at Nona, and he listened and interposed, and turned his eyes from her face to Sabre's, and from Sabre's back to hers, with his handsome head slightly c.o.c.ked to one side and with much gleaming in his eyes; rather as if he had on some private mock.

Fantastical notion! What mock could he have?

”Well, about my word 'elegant',” Nona was going on, ”and why it is mine--weren't you asking?”

Sabre said he had. ”Yes, why yours?”

”Why, you see, Derry and Toms is a case of it.” She tickled her horse's ears with her riding switch, and he stamped a hoof on the ground and arched his neck as though he knew he was a case of it and was proud of being a case of it. ”I wanted an elegant name for him and I always think two names are so elegant for a firm--”

”Bloodsucker and Noodle are mine,” said Lord Tybar in a very gloomy voice; and they laughed.

”--So I called him Derry and Toms.”

Sabre pointed out that this still left her own possession of the word unexplained.

”Oh, Marko, you're dreadfully matter-of-fact. You always were. Why, Tony and I get fond of a word and then we have it for our own, whichever of us it is, and use it for everything. And elegant's mine just now. I'm dreadfully fond of it. It's so--well, elegant: there you are, you see!”

Lord Tybar announced that he had just become attached to a new word and desired to possess it. He was going to have blood. ”You see, if I live by sucking blood--”

”Tony, you're disgusting!”

”I know. I'm the most frightful things. I'm just beginning to realise it. Yes, blood's mine, Nona. Copyright. All rights reserved. Blood.”

”Well, so long as you stick to the noun and don't use the adjective,”

she said; and they all laughed again.

Lord Tybar gathered up his reins and stroked his left hand along them.

”Well, kindness to animals!” he said. ”That's another of my beautiful qualities. The perfect understanding between me and my horses tells me the mare has seen enough of you, Sabre. She tells me all her thoughts in her flanks and they Marconi up my nervous and receptive legs. I must write and tell the _Searchlight_ that. Perhaps they'll think better of me.”--The mare, feeling his hand, began to dance coquettishly. ”You'll come up and see us often, now you know we're back, won't you? Nona likes seeing you, don't you, Nona?” And again he looked from Nona to Sabre and back at Nona again with that look of mocking drollery.

”Oh, you're all right, Marko,” Nona agreed, ”when you're not too matter-of-fact. Yes, do come up. There's always a harsh word and a blow for you at Northrepps.”

The mare steadied again. She stretched out her neck towards Sabre and quivered her nostrils at him, sensing him. He put up a hand to stroke her beautiful muzzle and she threw up her head violently and swerved sharply around.

Not in the least discomposed, Lord Tybar, his body in perfect rhythm with her curvettings, laughed at Sabre over his shoulder. ”She thinks you're up to something, Sabre. She thinks you've got designs on us.

Marvellous how I know! Whisper and I shall hear, loved one. You'll hurt yourself in a minute.”