It seemed a day of meetings, for when we got down to the end, we encountered Lord Robert, walking leisurely in our direction. He looked as black as night when he caught sight of us.
“Hello, Bob!” said Mr. Carruthers, cheerfully. “Ages since I saw you—will you come and dine to-night? I have a box for this winter opera that is on, and I am trying to persuade Miss Travers to come. She says Lady Verningham is not engaged to-night, she knows, and we might dine quietly, and all go, don’t you think so?”
Lord Robert said he would, but he added, “Miss Travers would never come out before; she said she was in too deep mourning.” He seemed aggrieved.
“I am going to sit in the back of the box, and no one will see me,” I said, “and I do love music so.”
“We had better let Lady Verningham know at once then,” said Mr. Carruthers.
Lord Robert announced he was going there now, and would tell her.
I knew that! The blue tea-gown, with the pink roses, and the lace cap, and the bad cold were not for nothing. (I wish I had not written this, it is spiteful of me, and I am not spiteful as a rule. It must be the east wind.)
Thursday night, Nov. 24th.
“Now that you have embarked upon this,” Lady Ver said, when I ventured into her sitting-room, hearing no voices, about six o’clock (Mr. Carruthers had left me at the door, at the end of our walk, and I had been with the angels at tea ever since), “Now that you have embarked upon this opera, I say, you will have to dine at Willis’s with us. I won’t be in when Charlie arrives from Paris. A windy day, like to-day, his temper is sure to be impossible.”
“Very well,” I said.