Valentine colored. He had spoken hastily, and had quite forgotten Sacha’s presence.
He answered his brother dryly.
“I generalize, of course. I do not mean that every artist must necessarily be objectionable, but I do consider their calling objectionable when connected with a private house. Take your own studio, for instance; you are compelled to have it thronged from time to time with people who are certainly not desirable.”
“They are very harmless,” Sacha observed.
He pulled his mustache, and leaning back in his chair, looked at his brother thoughtfully.
“I still maintain there is no possibility of Mrs. Pennington entertaining this idea,” Valentine said shortly.
“It is not Mrs. Pennington who does anything, it is Polly,” Grace said, a little crossly. She did not like having her suggestions set at naught in this way.
Sacha, with a little laugh, changed the conversation, but his curiosity was sharply aroused, and he scented a mystery.
It was, of course, just like Valentine to mingle himself up in this intimate way with other people’s affairs; still, there was something unlike his usual manner about him to-day, and Sacha resolved to investigate this matter further.
Accordingly, the next day he arrayed himself in his usual smart fashion, and drove direct to the Penningtons’ house.