“La, you little darling, you’ve made me cry with your butterflies and things. Come here while I buss you.”
There was a gentleman sitting by her, foremost of two or three that were in the box, and he made room for me with an indulgent smile. He was a genial, precise-looking person, with a star on his right breast, and the queue of his wig reaching down his back in long curls that were gathered into a ribbon. I took him, rightly, to be Sir William, the husband, and made him my demure bow as I passed. His lady gave me a great kiss, in full view of the house, and taking a little jewel from her bosom, pinned it into mine.
“There,” she said, “wear this for Lady Hamilton, in token of the only reel feeling she has come across in your beastly city.”
Sir William put his hand on her arm.
“My dear,” he said.
She fanned herself boisterously. She had been disappointed, everyone knew, in her designs to be received at court, and was to leave England in a few days missing the coveted honour. Somehow she reminded me of the “bouncing chit” that our gentlemen call a champagne bottle—she so gushed and sparkled, and was a little large and loud.
I made my acknowledgments quite prettily, and left the box; and, once got outside, leaned for a moment against the wall, with a feeling of mortal sickness come over me. For, as I retreated, I had come face to face with those seated at the back—and one of them was the Earl of Herring.
Had he recognised me? He had not appeared to lift his eyes, even, as he sat at discussion with his neighbour. And that might be the most deadly sign of all.
I don’t know how I got through the rest of my part. But that night I clung to Patty as if she were my only support in a failing world.
Morning brought some reassurance; and so, for a further evening or two, finding myself still unmolested, I struggled to convince myself that he had not seen, or that I was forgotten, and my fault passed over. But all the time the terror lay at my heart.