But the contents of it were even more enraging. The Prince profoundly regretted, in the third person, that matters of great importance compelled him and the Princess to leave London that day, and that he would therefore be unable to honour himself by accepting her invitation.
"And he besieged me for an invitation only yesterday," she said to Jack, "and I've changed the whole table. Darling, tell them to alter everything back again to what it was. Beastly old fat thing! Really Germans have no manners.... Daddy has been encouraging him too much. If he rings up again say we're all dead."
Dodo instantly recovered herself as she drove down Piccadilly. The streets were teeming with happy, busy people, and she speedily felt herself the happiest and busiest of them all. She had to go to her dressmakers to see about some gowns for Goodwood, and others for Cowes; she had to go to lunch somewhere at one in order to be in time for a wedding at two, she had to give half an hour to an artist who was painting her portrait, and look in at a garden party. Somehow or other, apparently simultaneously, she was due at the rehearsal of a new Russian ballet, and she had definitely promised to attend a lecture in a remote part of Chelsea on the development of the sub-conscious self. Then she was playing bridge at a house in Berkeley Square—what a pity she could not listen to the lecture about the sub-conscious self while she was being dummy—and it was positively necessary to call at Carlton House Terrace and enquire after the German Ambassador. This latter errand had better be done at once, and then she could turn her mind to the task of simplifying the rest of the day.
There were entrancing distractions all round. She was caught in a block exactly opposite the Ritz Hotel, and cheek to jowl with her motor was that of the Prime Minister, and she told him he would be late for his Cabinet meeting. He got out of the block first by shewing an ivory ticket, and Dodo consoled herself for not being equally well-equipped by seeing a large flimsy portmanteau topple off a luggage trolley which was being loaded opposite the Ritz. It had a large crown painted on the end of it in scarlet, with an "A" below, and it needed but a moment's conjecture to feel sure that it belonged to Prince Albert. Whatever was the engagement that made him leave London so suddenly, it necessitated an immense amount of luggage, for the trolley was full of boxes with crowns and As to distinguish them. The fall had burst open the flimsy portmanteau, and shirts and socks and thick underwear were being picked off the roadway.... Dodo wondered as her motor moved on again if he was going to quarter himself on her father for the remainder of his stay in England.
A few minutes later she drew up at the door of the German Embassy, and sent her footman with her card to make enquiries. Even as he rang the bell, the door opened, and Prince Albert was shewn out by the Ambassador. The two shook hands, and the Prince came down the three steps, opposite which Dodo's motor was drawn up. It was open, there could have been no doubt about his seeing her, but it struck her that his intention was to walk away without appearing to notice her. That, of course, was quite impermissible.
"Bisque soup," she said by way of greeting. "And me scouring London for lobsters."
He gave the sort of start that a dramatic rhinoceros might be expected to give, if it intended to carry the impression that it was surprised.
"Ah, Lady Dodo," said he. "Is it indeed you? I am heartbroken at not coming to your house to-night. But the Princess has to go into the country; there was no getting out of it. So sad. Also, we shall make a long stay in the country; I do not know when we shall get back. I will take your humble compliments to the Princess, will I not? I will take also your regrets that you will not have the honour to receive her to-night. And your amiable Papa; I was to have lunched with him to-day, but now instead I go into the country. And also, I will step along. Auf wiedersehen, Lady Dodo."
Suddenly a perfect shower of fresh straws seemed to join those others which she and Edith had spoken about last night, and they all moved the same way. There was the note which she had received half an hour ago saying that the Prince could not accept the invitation he had so urgently asked for; there was the fact of those piles of luggage leaving the Ritz; there was his call this morning at the German Embassy, above all there was his silence as to where he was going and his obvious embarrassment at meeting her. The tide swept them all along together, and she felt she knew for certain what his destination was.