Cecil’s face grew hot.
“Will you tell her that—that I knew nothing of her engagement? No! tell her nothing!”
“I think that is far the better course, my lord,” said Percy Levant, and with another bow he went.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
CONSPIRATORS.
Mr. Spenser Churchill had been having the very good time which a man might be expected to have who has had a magnificent palace with a host of obsequious servants placed at his disposal, and who is monarch of all he surveys—of another person’s property.
He enjoyed himself most amazingly. He went on pleasant little excursions to the neighboring towns; he ordered the richest and most luxurious dinners; he accepted the best of the numerous invitations which Lady Despard’s neighbors freely accorded him, as a friend of her ladyship left in charge of the Villa Rimini, and wherever he went he was voted a most charming and agreeable companion. Indeed, since Percy Levant’s departure no one had so completely won the hearts of the Florentine ladies as Mr. Spenser Churchill.
And do not for a moment suppose that the good man gave himself up to carnal enjoyment without giving thought to his less fortunate fellowmen. No! The eminent and tender-hearted philanthropist remembered his poor brethren, and gave such touching accounts of the various charitable societies with which he was connected—“The Sweeps’ Orphanage,” “The Indigent Knife Grinders’ Society,” “The Society for the Distribution of Knives and Forks to the South Sea Islanders,” and so on, that he succeeded in collecting a very tidy sum for these eminently deserving and practical charities; and everybody agreed that if ever there was a man too good for this sinful and selfish world, Mr. Spenser Churchill was indeed that individual!
And so the days passed pleasantly—and profitably—and on the morning of the sixteenth Mr. Spenser Churchill was sitting over the second bottle of Lady Despard’s choicest claret, with a cigarette between his lips, and his benevolent eyes half-closed, with that expression of bland peace and serenity which only the truly good can experience, when a servant brought him a letter.
He eyed it with sleepy indifference until he saw the writing, and the man had left the room; then he tore the letter open eagerly.