Dash it, I hate etiquette.' He lowered his voice. 'Bruce is looking pretty blooming. Not so many illnesses lately has he?'

'Not when he's at home,' said Edith.

'Ah! At the F O the dear fellow does, I'm afraid, suffer a good deal from nerves,' said Mr Mitch.e.l.l, especially towards the end of the day. About four o'clock, I mean, you know! You know old Bruce! Good sort he is. I see he hasn't got the woman I meant him to sit next to, somehow or other. I see he's next to Miss Coniston.'

'Oh, he likes her.'

'Good, good. Thought she was a bit too artistic, and high-browed, as the Americans say, for him. But now he's used to that sort of thing, isn't he? Madame Frabelle, eh? Wonderful woman. No soup, Edith: why not?'

'It makes me silent,' said Edith; 'and I like to talk.'

Mitch.e.l.l laughed loudly. 'Ha ha! Champagne for Mrs Ottley. What are you about?' He looked up reprovingly at the servant. Mr Mitch.e.l.l was the sort of man who never knows, after twenty years' intimate friendship, whether a person takes sugar or not.

Edith allowed the man to fill her gla.s.s. She knew it depressed Mr Mitch.e.l.l to see people drinking water. So she only did it surrept.i.tiously, and as her gla.s.s was always full, because she never drank from it, Mr Mitch.e.l.l was happy.

A very loud feminine laugh was heard.

'That's Miss Radford,' said Mr Mitch.e.l.l. 'That's how she always goes on.

She's always laughing. She was immensely charmed with you the day she called on you with my wife.'

'Was she?' said Edith, who remembered she herself had been out on that occasion.

'Tremendously. I can't remember what she said: I think it was how clever you were.'

'She saw Madame Frabelle. I wasn't at home.'

'Ha ha! Good, very good!' Mr Mitch.e.l.l turned to his other neighbour.

'Eh bien,' said Sir t.i.to, who was waiting his opportunity. 'Commence!'

At once Edith began murmuring in a low voice her story of herself and Aylmer, and related today's conversation in Jermyn Street.

Sir t.i.to nodded his head occasionally. When he listened most intently, he appeared to be looking round the table at other people. He lifted a gla.s.s of champagne and bowed over it to Mrs Mitch.e.l.l; then he put his hand to his lips and blew a kiss.

'Who's that for?' Edith asked, interrupting herself.

'C'est pour la vieille.'

'Madame Frabelle! Why do you kiss your hand to her?'

'To keep her quiet. Look at her: she's so impressed, and thinks it so wicked, that she's blushing and uncomfortable. I've a splendid way, Edith (pardon), of silencing all these elderly ladies who make love to me. I don't say "Ferme!" I'm polite to them.'

Edith laughed. Sir t.i.to was not offended.

'Yes, you needn't laugh, my dear child. I'm not old enough yet pour les jeunes; at any rate, if I am they don't know it. I'm still pursued by the upper middle-age cla.s.s, with grat.i.tude for favours to come (as they think).'

'Well, what's your plan?'

He giggled.

'I tell Madame Frabelle, Madame Meetchel, Lady Everard--first, that they have beautiful lips; then, that I can't look at them without longing to kiss them. Lady Everard, after I said that, kept her hand before her face the whole evening, so as not to distract me, and drive me mad.

Consequently she couldn't talk.'

'Do they really believe you?'

'Evidemment!... I wonder,' he continued mischievously, as he refused wine, 'whether Madame Frabelle will confess to you tonight about my pa.s.sion for her, or whether she will keep it to herself?'

'I dare say she'll tell me. At least she'll ask me if I think so or not.'

'Si elle te demande, tu diras que tu n'en sais rien! Well, I think....'

'What?'

'You must wait. Wait and see. Really, it's impossible, my dear child, for you to accept an invitation for an elopement as if it were a luncheon-party. Not only that, it's good for Aylmer to be kept in doubt.

Excellent for his health.'

'Really?'

'When I say his health, I mean the health and strength of his love for you. You must vacillate, Edith. Souvent femme varie. You sit on the fence, n'est-ce-pas? Well, offer the fence to him. But, take it away before he sits down. Voila!'

Edith laughed. 'But then this girl, Miss Clay, she's always there. And I like her.'

'What is her nationality?'

'How funny you should ask that! I think she must be of Spanish descent.

She's so quiet, so religious, and has a very dark complexion. And yet wonderful light blue eyes.'

'Quelle histoire! Qu'est-ce-que ca fait?'

'The poor girl is mad about Aylmer. He doesn't seem to know it, but he makes her worse by his indifference,' Edith said.

'Why aren't you jealous of her, ma chere? No, I won't ask you that--the answer is obvious.'

'I mean this, that if I can't ever do what he wishes, I feel she could make him happy; and I could bear it if she did.'

'Spanish?' said Landi, as if to himself. 'Ole! ole! Does she use the castanets, and wear a mantilla instead of a cap?'

'How frivolous and silly you are. No, of course not. She looks quite English, in fact particularly so.'

'And yet you insist she's Spanish! Well, my advice is this. If he has a secret alliance with Spain, you should a.s.sume the Balkan att.i.tude.'

'Good gracious! What's that?'

'We're talking politics,' said Landi, across the table. 'Politics, and geography! Fancy, Meetchel, Mrs Ottley doesn't know anything about the Balkans!'

'Ha, very good,' said Mitch.e.l.l. 'Capital. What a fellow you are!' He gave his hearty, clubbable laugh. Mr Mitch.e.l.l belonged to an exceptionally large number of clubs and was a favourite at all. His laugh was the chief cause of his popularity there.

'Il est fou,' said Landi quietly to Edith. 'Quel monde! I don't think there are half-a-dozen sane people at this table.'