Her Faithful Knight — page 113: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Mr. Darcy’s Comedy Company. 10g shoes, who likewise strolled in twos and threes, smoking cheap tobacco. Miss Graham and her mother were tak- ing a constitutional and looking out for the Hon. Darcy and his two friends. Mr. Stourton-Chepe, who, to the disgust of his wife, had struck up a friendship with Mar- maduke Strutt, walked up and down, discussing the drama with the melancholy-minded comedian, and Mr. and Mrs. Devine were also on the parade, with their boy Dick, who had been brought down in the hope that a page-boy might be wanted for announcements, or the comedy scenes lightened by juvenile acrobatic perform- ances and imitations of popular actors. But Mr. Darcy’s leading lady was not among the gaily- dressed, moving, chattering throng, and her absence troubled her manager. The Hon. Darcy Derrick was not so young or so inexperienced as he looked, and he saw clearly that Miss Knight was not likely to find congenial companionship among the members of the company. He said as much to his two friends, Bobby Coles and Jack Wyverley, as the three enjoyed an excellent dinner in the best hotel on the Hastings sea front that evening. “By Jove! What a queen Miss Knight looked among those people on the platform to-day!” he observed, after a short silence, during dessert. ' The other men laughed and exchanged glances. “Gone again, eh, Darcy?” “T hate that flippant way of talking of a woman,” ex- claimed the Hon. Darcy angrily. “I never think about that girl without wanting to take my hat off.” ‘She is better looking than Ella Carisbrooke,” said Mr. Coles reflectively. “Better style and all that, of course, and doesn’t dye her hair. But Ella looks ripping from the stalls, and—and I don’t myself care for your particu- lar, ladylike sort of women on the stage. I like chic and go, and I think the public does, too,” Eomichbooks (E@)