Presently, out of the ladies' cloak-room come two fascinating figures--the one plump and matronly, with grey hair and a capacious neck glittering with diamonds,--the other a slim girl in pale pink, with dark eyes and a ravishing complexion, for whom the lazy gentlemen on the stairs make immediate and respectful room.
"How d'ye do, Mrs. Van Clupp?" says one of the loungers.
"Glad to see you, Miss Marcia!" says another, a sandy-haired young man, with a large gardenia in his button-hole, and a glass in his eye.
At the sound of his voice Miss Marcia stops and regards him with a surprised smile. She is very pretty, is Marcia,--bewitchingly pretty,--and she has an air of demure grace and modesty about her that is perfectly charming. Why? oh, why does she not remain in that sylph-like, attitude of questioning silence? But she speaks--and the charm is broken.
"Waal now! Dew tell!" she exclaims. "I thought yew were in Pa-ar--is! Ma, would yew have concluded to find Lord Algy here? This is too lovely! If I'd known yew were coming I'd have stopped at home--yes, I would--that's so!"
And she nods her little head, crowned with its glossy braids of chestnut hair, in a very coquettish manner, while her mother, persistently beaming a stereotyped company smile on all around her, begins to ascend the stairs, beckoning her daughter to follow. Marcia does so, and Lord Algernon Masherville escorts her.
"You--you didn't mean that!" he stammers rather feebly--"You--you don't mind my being here, do you? I'm--I'm awfully glad to see you again, you know--and--er--all that sort of thing!"
Marcia darts a keen glance at him,--the glance of an observant, clear-headed magpie.
"Oh yes! I dare say!" she remarks with airy scorn. "S'pect me to believe yew! Waal! Did yew have a good time in Pa-ar--is?"
"Fairly so," answers Lord Masherville indifferently. "I only came back two days ago. Lady Winsleigh met me by chance at the theatre, and asked me to look in to-night for 'some fun' she said. Have you any idea what she meant?"
"Of course!" says the fair New Yorker, with a little nasal laugh,--"don't yew know? We're all here to see the fisherwoman from the wilds of Norway,--the creature Sir Philip Errington married last year. I conclude she'll give us fits all round, don't yew?"
Lord Masherville, at this, appears to hesitate. His eye-glass troubles him, and he fidgets with its black string. He is not intellectual--he is the most vacillating, most meek and timid of mortals--but he is a gentleman in his own poor fashion, and has a sort of fluttering chivalry about him, which, though feeble, is better than none.