London has got hold of me. I am fascinated by it. Either it has improved as it has grown, or I am in a mood to be pleased with anything English. Do you remember dear old Ennis's Rooms, which you and I used to think the height of luxury and gaiety? I've promised myself to go there again, and I mean to take Ellaline and Emily to supper after the theatre to-night. I think I shall keep this letter open to tell you how the old place impresses me.
Midnight and a half.
I've had a shock. Ennis's is dead as a doornail. We entered, after the theatre, and galvanized the Rooms into a kind of dreadful life. They "don't serve many suppers now, sir," it seems. "It's mostly luncheons and dinners."
The waiters resented us as intruders. We were the only ones, too, which made it worse, as all their rancour was visited on us; but we hadn't been for many minutes at our old favourite table (the one thing unchanged), trying to keep up a spurious gaiety, when another party of two ventured in.
They were young Dick Burden and his aunt, Mrs. Senter.
Now, you mayn't see it, but this was rather odd. It wouldn't have been odd in the past, to meet your most intimate friend from round the corner, and the Shah of Persia, at Ennis's. But evidently the "people who amuse themselves" don't come now. It's not "the thing." Why, therefore, should this couple choose Ennis's for supper? They haven't been out of England for fifteen years, like me. If Mrs. Senter occasionally spends Saturday to Monday in India, or visits the Sphinx when the Sphinx is in season, she always returns to London when "everybody is in town," and there does as everybody does.
I immediately suspected that Burden had brought her with an object: that object, to gain an introduction to Ellaline. The suspicion may seem far-fetched; but you wouldn't pronounce it so if you could have seen the young man's face, in the railway station at Paris, the other day. I had that privilege; and I observed at the time his wish to know my ward, without feeling a responsive one to gratify it. I don't know why I didn't feel it, but I didn't, though the desire was both pardonable and natural in the young fellow. He has a determined jaw; therefore perhaps it's equally natural that, when disappointed, he should persist—even follow, and adopt strong measures (in other words, an aunt) to obtain his object. You see, Ellaline is an extremely pretty girl, and I'm not alone in thinking so.
My idea is that, having found us in the newspapers, staying at the Ritz, the boy must have somehow informed himself as to our movements, awaiting his opportunity—or his aunt. I bought my theatre tickets in the hotel. He may have got his information from there; and the rest was easy—as far as Ennis's. I'm afraid the rest was, too, because Mrs. Senter selected the table nearest ours, and after we had exchanged greetings proposed that we join parties. The tables were placed together, and introductions all round were a matter of course. Young England expects that every aunt will do her duty!
They still give you very good food at Ennis's, but it's rather like eating "funeral baked meats."