"Hush!" whispered Isabel, "they are coming."
And then that silence fell upon everybody which always falls just before something is going to happen—be that something the advent of a royal procession, or only the more every-day occurrence of dawn. The officers of the Household entered walking backwards, and all the company rose to their feet as the orchestra struck up the National Anthem. Finally the Royalties themselves appeared and bowed to their assembled guests, while the ladies curtsied in response, till the room looked like a cornfield when a summer breeze goes by.
When everybody was seated, Isabel whispered to Lord Wrexham: "I do love anything in the shape of a function; it gives me a thrill all down my back. Do you ever have thrills down your back?"
Lord Wrexham considered for a moment: he never answered a question hurriedly, lest he should thereby be led into inaccuracy. "No, I cannot say that I ever do, unless I am suffering from the effects of a chill."
"Then there must be something wrong with your back, if 'God Save the Queen' does not send a thrill all down it. I would consult a spine doctor if I were you—a 'bacteriologist' I suppose one would call him."
"If you feel a sensation of that kind now, I feel sure you must be sitting in a draught; I can account for it in no other way," said Lord Wrexham, his kind face clouded over with loverlike anxiety.
"Nonsense!" replied Isabel rather sharply, "what I feel is no draught, but a deeply rooted human instinct which cries out for functions both in Church and State; and that instinct will have to be eradicated before all forms of Royalty and Ritualism can be abolished from this best of all possible worlds. It takes a strong Government to disestablish an instinct."
"I cannot quite follow you, dear; you go too quickly for a slow old coach like myself, and I am mentally out of breath with trying to keep up with you. What connection can a draught down one's back have with established methods of worship and government?"
"Never mind about following me; I am not worth the trouble. And we must not talk any more; the music is beginning."
After the music began, strange and disturbing thoughts whirled through Isabel's mind. Whether it was because the beauty of sight and sound stimulated her emotional nature, she could not tell; but the old, aching hunger for Paul, which she had succeeded in stifling for so long, woke up and would not be put to silence. She looked at the gorgeous scene around her, and realized that the world had given her of its best; she had bartered her heart and her soul for its glory and honour, and the price had been paid her to the uttermost farthing. She had nothing to complain of on that score; and she was too clever and experienced a woman to call the triumph she had accomplished dust and ashes. It was a good enough thing in its way, only it was not Paul—and Paul, unfortunately, was the only thing that she cared for. It is absurd to call worldly success worthless, because it does not happen to be the precise thing that we personally desire; just as it would be absurd to call roast beef uneatable, when we happen to be thirsty rather than hungry. But we want what we want, and not what is suitable or convenient or wise—and nothing else in the whole world will satisfy us.