Volume I Part 13 (1/2)

”Did she remember my existence?”

”Oh dear, yes! She said she expected you on Sunday. She never asked _me_ to come.” Letty looked arch. ”But then one doesn't expect her to have pretty manners. People say she is shy. But, of course, that is only your friends' way of saying that you're rude.”

”She wasn't rude to you?” said George, outwardly eager, inwardly sceptical. ”Shall I not go on Sunday?”

”But of course you must go. We shall have to know them. She's not a woman's woman--that's all. Now, are we going to get some dinner, for Tully and I are famis.h.i.+ng?”

”Come along, then, and I'll collect the party.”

George had asked a few of his acquaintance in the House to meet his betrothed, together with an old General Tressady and his wife who were his distant cousins. The party were to a.s.semble in the room of an under-secretary much given to such hospitable functions; and thither accordingly George led the way.

The room, when they reached it, was already fairly full of people, and alive with talk.

”Another party!” said George, looking round him. ”Benson is great at this sort of thing.”

”Do you see Lady Maxwell?” said Letty, in his ear.

George looked to his right, and perceived the lady in question. She also recognised him at once, and bowed, but without rising. She was the centre of a group of people, who were gathered round her and the small table on which she was leaning, and they were so deeply absorbed in the conversation that had been going on that they hardly noticed the entrance of Tressady and his companion.

”Leven has a party, you see,” said the under-secretary. ”Blaythwaite was to have taken them in--couldn't at the last moment; so they had to come in here. This is _your_ side of the room! But none of your guests have come yet. Dinner at the House in the winter is a poor sort of business, Miss Sewell. We want the Terrace for these occasions.”

He led the young girl to a sofa at the further end of the room, and made himself agreeable, to him the easiest process in the world. He was a fas.h.i.+onable and charming person, in the most irreproachable of frock-coats, and Letty was soon at her ease with him, and mistress of all her usual arts and graces.

”You know Lady Maxwell?” he said to her, with a slight motion of the head towards the distant group.

Letty replied; and while she and her companion chattered, George, who was standing behind them, watched the other party.

They were apparently in the thick of an argument, and Lady Maxwell, whose hands were lightly clasped on the table in front of her, was leaning forward with the look of one who had just shot her bolt, and was waiting to see how it would strike.

It struck apparently in the direction of her _vis-a-vis,_ Sir Frank Leven, for he bent over to her, making a quick reply in a half-petulant boy's voice. He had been three years in the House, but had still the air of an Eton ”swell” in his last half.

Lady Maxwell listened to what he had to say, a sort of silent pa.s.sion in her face all the time--a n.o.ble pa.s.sion n.o.bly restrained.

When he stopped, George caught her reply.

”He has neither _seen_ nor _felt_--every sentence showed it--that is all one can say. How can one take his judgment?”

George's mouth twitched. He slipped, smiling, into a place beside Letty.

”Did you hear that?” he inquired.

”Fontenoy's speech, of course,” said the under-secretary, looking round.

”She's pitching into Leven, I suppose. He's as cranky and unsound as he can be. Shouldn't wonder if you got him before long.”

He nodded good-temperedly to Tressady, then got up to speak to a man on the edge of the further group.

”How amusing!” said George, his satirical eyes still watching Lady Maxwell. ”How much that set has 'seen and felt' of sweaters, and white-lead workers, and that ilk! Don't they look like it?”

”Who are they?”

Letty was now using all her eyes to find out, and especially for the purpose of carrying away a mental photograph of Lady Maxwell's black hat and dress.