Mrs. Carruthers rose from the table and Jane Repton had no further word with Thresk that night. In the drawing-room Mrs. Carruthers led him from woman to woman, allowing him ten minutes for each one.
"He might be Royalty or her pet Pekingese," cried Mrs. Repton in exasperation. For now that her blood had cooled she was not so sure that her advice had been good. The habit of respect for authority resumed its ancient place in her. She might be planting that night the seed of a very evil flower. "Respectability" had seemed to her a magnificent poem as she sat at the dinner-table. Here in the drawing-room she began to think that it was not for every-day use. She wished a word now with Thresk, so that she might make light of the advice which she had given. "I had no business to interfere," she kept repeating to herself whilst she talked with her host. "People get what they want if they want it enough, but they can't control the price they have to pay. Therefore it was no business of mine to interfere."
But Thresk took his leave and gave her no chance for a private word. She drove homewards a few minutes later with her husband; and as they descended the hill to the shore of Back Bay he said:
"I had a moment's conversation with Thresk after you had left the dining-room, and what do you think?"
"Tell me!"
"He asked me for a letter of introduction to Ballantyne at Chitipur."
"But he knows Stella!" exclaimed Jane Repton.
"Does he? He didn't tell me that! He simply said that he had time to see
Chitipur before he sailed and asked for a line to the Resident."
"And you promised to give him one?"
"Of course. I am to send it to the Taj Mahal hotel to-morrow morning."