Chapter XVIII
"My dear," said Mrs. Bobby, "I'm so sorry to be late. Luncheon was interminable. Why, Julian, who would have expected to see you here?" She gave him her hand demurely, with softly shining eyes. Neither her surprise nor her contrition seemed to ring quite true.
Gerard's dark eyes were again half closed beneath their heavy lids. He looked, if a trifle pale, more impassive than usual.
"I don't know why my presence here should cause so much surprise," he said. "Most people come here, don't they, some time or another. It's a—a meeting-place, isn't it?"
"It seems to have been on this occasion," Mrs. Bobby murmured under her breath. A young man had just stopped and spoken to Elizabeth, and the words might have referred to him. Gerard smiled.
"Won't you come and look at some of these pictures?" he asked. "I want to talk to you."
"You awaken my curiosity."
They walked slowly along the gallery which skirted the hall, too deep in conversation to pay much heed to the pictures which hung along their way. Elizabeth's eyes followed them, the while she was repeating mechanically "Yes, the portraits are extremely fine."
"But not one," the young man declared, with blunt gallantry "to compare with yours. It's by all odds the most beautiful picture here."