Feeling very virtuous, he made his way home. Again the clocks clattered in the gloom as he helped himself liberally from the brandy decanter. It was only as the night drew on that he realized he had had nothing to eat and the brandy was rising to his brain in an irritatingly mortal way.

One hour to dawn. Where on earth was she? He felt very injured. Were it not for him, then she would be scrubbing pots in the scullery and no doubt be big with child by that wretch Bessant. And this was all the thanks he got!

Then he heard the rumble of the carriage wheels on the cobbles outside and Alice’s light laugh followed by a hearty masculine guffaw. She had brought Sir Peregrine home! This was the outside of enough. He strode into the hall and wrenched open the street door. Alice and Miss Fadden stood there, looking with startled expressions at his angry face.

“Where is he?” demanded the Duke.

“Who?” replied Alice, trying to move past him into the hall but finding her way barred.

“Don’t be missish! Sir Peregrine.”

“I don’t know,” said Alice pettishly. “We went on to the Hammond party with Sir Peregrine and we have just left there. I should think he is probably still there.”

“Don’t fool me,” snarled the ghost. “I heard a distinctly masculine laugh.”

Alice giggled. “Oh, that was Miss Fadden.”

The ghost stared wrathfully at the companion who looked as faded and meek as ever.

Feeling obscurely that he was making himself ridiculous, the Duke stood aside to allow both ladies to enter. “Miss Fadden,” he said, “leave me alone with my niece, I pray you.”

Miss Fadden curtsied demurely and bade him a whispered “Goodnight” while he stared suspiciously after her retreating figure. Surely such a quiet mouselike creature could not have had a laugh like that.

He walked into the drawing room, holding the doors open for Alice.

“Now, Alice,” he said sternly, “I think you were remiss in not leaving me a note to say you would be so late. It is nearly dawn.”

“It is indeed,” yawned Alice in an indifferent way which made the ghost even angrier. “I danced and danced and danced.”

“No more than twice with Sir Peregrine, I hope,” he said. “We do not give rise to gossip.”

“But we do hope to marry,” said Alice, sitting up straight. “If it makes you feel better, we observed the conventions. Sir Peregrine,” she added with a blush, “is all that is proper.”

“I am overjoyed to hear it,” said the ghost nastily. “But I do not think you should plunge into another engagement so soon. You are too precipitate.”

“The whole point of the exercise,” said Alice hotly, “is to find me a husband. Well, I have found someone kind and charming and… and… young. I think we should deal together extremely well.”