Cards and invitations began to pour in upon General Talbott and his daughter, but the dinner at the Embassy was the first formal entertainment which they attended.
Sir Percy's first meeting with Lucy Armytage after Alicia Vernon's arrival was purely accidental. He had taken his late afternoon walk eastward, and as he crossed, after sunset, the deserted plaza of the Capitol he noticed Lucy's slim figure standing in the purple dusk upon the Capitol terrace. She did not know he was near until he spoke, and then she turned, her face and eyes flooded with the joy of the unexpected meeting. She had come from the National Library with a book, and announced her intention to walk back to the hotel.
"Since I am to be an Englishwoman, I shall probably be more English than the English themselves. I walk everywhere, and I have bought a pair of large thick boots, which my uncle declares he can't tell from his own."
Lucy's feet were slender enough to take this liberty with them. Lucy was full of her invitation to dinner at the British Embassy, where she had never dined before.
"It will be different," she said, "from any dinner I was ever at, because when Lord Baudesert and Mrs. Vereker know--you understand"--Sir Percy understood well enough, and Lucy continued--"they will, of course, look back and begin to canvass me and I want them to have a good opinion of me."
To which Sir Percy, like a true lover, replied:
"How could they have any other?" Yet the thought of Lucy coming face to face with Alicia Vernon made him sick at heart.
It was still light enough for them to remain out of doors twenty minutes, and the region of the Capitol, which swarmed with people during the day, was absolutely deserted. A sudden impulse prompted Sir Percy to say to her, as they strolled slowly along the quiet streets in the twilight:
"I have something to ask of you, something I hope you will grant."
Lucy turned upon him two laughing, adoring dark eyes; but the look upon Sir Percy's face sobered her.