“Just now,” she sighed, “the great affairs do not please me.”
“Yet they are interesting,” he replied. “The atmosphere at the present moment is electric, charged with all manner of strange possibilities. But we talk too seriously. Will you not let me know the names of some of your guests? With General Crossley I am already acquainted.”
“They really don’t count for very much,” she said, a little carelessly. “This is entirely aunt’s Friday night gathering, and they are all her friends. That is Lady Maltenby opposite you, and her husband on the other side of my aunt.”
“Maltenby,” he repeated. “Ah, yes! There is one son a Brigadier, is there not? And another one sees sometimes about town—a Mr. Julian Orden.”
“He is the youngest son.”
“Am I exceeding the privileges of friendship, Countess,” the Baron continued, “if I enquire whether there was not a rumour of an engagement between yourself and Mr. Orden, a few days ago?”
“It is in the air,” she admitted, “but at present nothing is settled. Mr. Orden has peculiar habits. He disappeared from Society altogether, a few days ago, and has only just returned.”
“A censor, was he not?”
“Something of the sort,” Catherine assented. “He went out to France, though, and did extremely well. He lost his foot there.”
“I have noticed that he uses a stick,” the Baron remarked. “I always find him a young man of pleasant and distinguished appearance.”