“Know! I should say I did know. Though, if I did not, I would take my oath to it. It’s got so a fellow can’t stir without running into one of them. How does Louis like her?”
Louis was the duke.
The duchess displayed her beautiful false teeth. “Oddly enough, when he was in the States, he went hunting with her Number One.”
“In the Rockies?” Tempest, with sudden interest, inquired. “In the Dakotas?”
“I fancy so. It was a place called, let me see; yes, Long Island, I think. I remember, he said it was very jolly.”
Tempest tossed his red head. “Her Number Two, I suppose, is that chap I have seen at the Little Club. The Lord knows how he got there. He looks like a thimblerigger.”
The duchess raised her opera-glass. “Possibly. Nowadays, so many men do, don’t you think? There is Marie de Fresnoy with the Helley-Quetgens! You will have her next to you on Sunday, Howard. Do not lacerate her tender heart.”
At the suggestion, Tempest made a face. His expression amused Camille de Joyeuse. Indulgently she added: “To make up for it you shall take Madame Barouffska out.”
But now the curtain was rising. The clear brilliance of the house faded into a golden gloom.