"And truthfully. Answer my question, please."
"Joan arrives to-morrow with her mother."
"I am glad," Leah assured him fervently. "Too many female cooks can never spoil the funeral broth. The more women you have in a mourning house the better. We like to weep in company and to talk obituary notices. That is, other women do. I fancy I have a dash of the man in me, and this sort of undertaker rejoicing gives me the creeps."
Lionel secretly agreed with her, although he disapproved of the mode of expression. Ostentatious grief he disliked, as most men do, and discussing funeral emotions threadbare was not to his healthy liking. Therefore did he talk business with Lady Jim. It was necessary to distract his attention, she said, and so set about plundering the heir. By the time coffee arrived Lionel had promised her the Curzon Street house as a gift, and had agreed to pay all debts as the late Duke had arranged. Also, untruthfully assured by Leah that her temporal prosperity had suffered by the untimely demise of Jim, he promised to pay a quarterly thousand a year for the rest of her life.
"Yes," said Lionel, emphatically, "even if you marry, Lady James."
"I have no intention of marrying yet," said Leah, who was busy with Kümmel. She really felt that the consoling of a tearful widow required Kümmel.
"I thought that Mr. Askew admired you."
"He admires a new schooner he has bought, and some woman in South America. Oh, Mr. Askew has a catholic mind, I can tell you."
"Dr. Demetrius!"
"He has gone to Russia, I believe, on business connected with his pardon. Didn't Joan tell you how he was taken ill in Paris?"