He began to mount the stairs again, and Wentworth followed him in silence.
At the drawing-room door Field paused and they entered together. It was almost Wentworth's first appearance since his trial. There was a moment or two of dead silence as he sauntered forward with Field. Then, with a little laugh to cover an instant's embarrassment, Lady Culverleigh came forward. She shook hands with Wentworth and asked where he had been in retreat.
Violet came forward from the piano very pale but quite composed, and shook hands also. Several people present followed suit, and soon there was a little crowd gathered round him, and Burleigh Wentworth was again the popular centre of attraction.
Percival Field kept in the background; it was not his way to assert himself in society. But he remained until Wentworth and the last guest had departed. And then very quietly but with indisputable insistence he drew Lady Violet away into the conservatory.
She was looking white and tired, but she held herself with a proud aloofness in his presence. While admitting his claim upon her, she yet did not voluntarily yield him an inch.
"Did you wish to speak to me?" she asked.
He stood a moment or two in silence before replying; then:
"Only to give you this," he said, and held out to her a small packet wrapped in tissue paper on the palm of his hand.
She took it unwillingly.
"The badge of servitude?" she said.