Stanley ascended the stairs with the sensations of an early Christian martyr going to the arena--indeed, he felt that a brace of hungry lions would be a happy release from his present predicament. As he reached the top step, a conversation, carried on in the low but excited tones of a man and a woman, reached his ears, which caused him to pause, partly out of curiosity at what he heard, but more because the words carried, in their meaning, a ray of hope to his breast.

"I tell you, I will not dine with those men. It is an insult to have asked me to receive them, they are----", but here the man, evidently her husband, interrupted earnestly in a low tone of voice, begging her to be silent, but she did not heed his request.

"I tell you," she continued, as he pa.s.sed on to the dining-rooms, "I will go back alone. Ugh! how I despise you!" loathing and contempt stung in her words. "If only my father were here, he would never permit----"

She turned suddenly, and crossed the hall to the staircase, coming face to face with the Secretary.

"What-- Inez? You? I did not know you were in London. But of course-- I might have known-- Then that was Colonel Darcy? I have never had an opportunity to congratulate him or--to wish you every happiness," he added bitterly.

"Don't, Jim! Don't!" There was something suspiciously like a sob in her low voice. "That is a mockery I cannot stand--at least from you."

"I fail to understand how my wishes, good or otherwise, would mean anything to Madame Darcy."

"No--you do not understand. That is just it. Oh, Jim--it has all been a piteous, horrible mistake. They lied to me--and then you did not come back. They said you were--oh, can't you see?"

The Secretary looked at the beautiful face before him, now flushed and distressed. How well he knew every line of that exquisite profile and the hair parted low and drawn back lightly from the brow.

"Let me explain," he urged hotly.

Madame Darcy had recovered her self-possession and drew herself up with a gesture of proud dignity.

"No--" she answered gently. "This is neither the time nor place for explanations between us. Will you see me to my carriage--please?"

"Oh, don't go! I need you so. Please stay and help me out of a most embarra.s.sing situation."

"What can I do for you?"

"Well, you see it is a most awkward predicament. My chaperon has been taken suddenly ill at the last moment, and is unable to be present," he began, plunging boldly into his subject. "As I am entertaining two young ladies at dinner to-night, you will understand my unfortunate situation.

Will you honour me by accepting the vacant place at the head of my table, as my chaperon?"

Madame Darcy said nothing for a moment, but looked intently at the Secretary.

"Who form your party, Mr. Stanley?" she asked presently.

"Do not call me Mr. Stanley, Inez."

"It is better--at least for the present."

"As you wish, Madame Darcy," he acquiesced stiffly.

"I cannot explain now--but believe me it is wiser. And your party consists of--?"

"Lady Isabelle McLane, daughter of the Dowager Marchioness of Port Arthur, Miss Fitzgerald, a niece of Lord Axminster, Lieutenant Kingsland, of the Royal Navy, and Lionel Kent-Lauriston--well, everybody knows him."

She smiled.

"Yes," she said, "I have met him; he is most charming." In saying which she but voiced the generally accepted verdict of society.

Everyone knew Kent-Lauriston and everyone liked him. He was a type of the most delightful cla.s.s of Englishman. With all his insular prejudices strong within him, and combining in his personality those rugged virtues for which the name of Britain is a synonym, he had in addition that rarest of talents, the quality of being all things to all men; for he was possessed of great tact and sympathy flavoured with a cheerful cynicism which hurt no one, and lent a piquancy to his conversation. It was said of him, were he put down in any English shire, he would not need to walk five miles to find a country house where he would be a welcome and an honoured guest.

"Then I may hope that you will do me this great kindness?" continued the Secretary.

"I accept with pleasure."

"And Colonel Darcy----" he began.

"My husband," she replied, not waiting for him to finish his sentence, "cannot possibly have any objection to my dining with my country's diplomatic representative. I will speak to him, however, and tell him when to order my carriage," and she pa.s.sed into the next room. Though unperceived himself, the Secretary saw reflected in a great mirror the scene that followed; her proud reserve as she delivered her dictum to her husband, his gesture of impatient anger, and the look which attended it; and finally the contempt with which she turned her back on him and swept out of the room. A moment later she was by Stanley's side, saying:--

"Will you take me to your guests?"

As she entered the reception room on the Secretary's arm, he trembled with evident agitation. Her marvellous beauty, the wonderful charm of her voice and manner brought to mind only too vividly a realising sense of something he had once hoped for--of something which, of late, he had tried to forget. Yet he was about to give a dinner to a lady whose future relations with himself had been a subject of debate for some months, not only in his own mind, but in the minds of his friends.

Miss Fitzgerald was the guest of the evening, and, it must be allowed, was one of the most winsome, heart-wrecking, Irish girls that ever delighted the gaze of a youth. She was tall, fair, and almost too slim for perfection of form, though possessed of a lissomeness of body that more than compensated for this lack, and she had, in addition, the frankest pair of blue eyes, and the most gorgeous halo of golden hair, that could well be imagined.

She was possessed of a legendary family in Ireland, and numerous sets of relations, who, though not very closely connected, were much in evidence in the social world of London. She had, however, no settled abiding place, and no visible means of support. She was sparkling, light-hearted, and perfect dare-devil, and the town rang with the histories of her exploits. All the men were devoted to her, and as a result, she was cordially hated by all the dowagers, because she effectively spoiled the chances of dozens of other less vivacious but more eligible debutantes. The remainder of the guests were brought together rather by circ.u.mstance than by design. Kent-Lauriston had been especially invited, because the Secretary knew him to be greatly prejudiced against the fascinating Belle, with regard to any matrimonial intentions she might be fostering. Miss Fitzgerald herself had suggested the Lieutenant, and the Lieutenant had opportunely hinted that his distant connection Lady Isabelle did not know Miss Fitzgerald, and as they were all to meet in a country house in Suss.e.x at the end of the week, perhaps it would be pleasanter to become acquainted beforehand.

At Madame Darcy's coming, such a feeling of relief was made manifest that her task would have been light, had not her charm of manner served to put all immediately at their ease. The ladies welcomed her warmly as a solution of an embarra.s.sing situation, and with men she was always a favourite, so the little party lost no time in seeking their already belated dinner.

At first, indeed, there was a little constraint, owing to the fact that Lady Isabelle, a type of the frigid high-cla.s.s British maiden, was disposed to a.s.sume an icy reserve towards Miss Fitzgerald, a young lady of whom she and her mother, a dragon among dowagers, thoroughly disapproved.

The conversation was desultory, as is mostly the case at dinners, and not till the champagne had been pa.s.sed for the second time did it become general, then it turned upon racing.

"You were at Ascot, I suppose?" asked Miss Fitzgerald of Madame Darcy.

"Oh, yes," she replied, "They are very amusing--your English races."

She spoke with just the slightest shade of foreign intonation, which rendered her speech charming. "I was on half a coach with four horses."

"What became of the other half?" queried the Lieutenant.

"That is not what you call it--it is not a pull----?" she ventured, a little shy at their evident amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Perhaps you mean a drag," suggested Stanley, coming to the rescue.

"Yes, that is it," she laughed, a bewitching little laugh, clear as a bell, adding, "I knew it was something it did not do."

"I always go in the Royal Enclosure," murmured Miss Fitzgerald languidly, turning her gaze on the Secretary, while she toyed with the course then before her. "It's beastly dull, but then one must do the correct thing."

It was a very simple game she was playing--quite pathetic in its simplicity--but dangerous in the presence of Lady Isabelle, in whose veins a little of the dragon blood certainly ran, as well as a great deal that was blue, and Miss Fitzgerald's a.s.sumption was a gage of battle not to be disregarded.

"Really. I gave up the Enclosure several years ago. It is getting so common nowadays," said her Ladyship, growing a degree more frigid while the Irish girl flushed.

"Perhaps Miss Fitzgerald enjoyed a run of luck to compensate her for the a.s.semblage?" suggested Kent-Lauriston drily.

"No," responded that young lady. "I came a beastly cropper."

"That was too bad for you," he replied.

"Or somebody else," suggested the Lieutenant, and amidst a burst of laughter Miss Fitzgerald regained her good humour.