“Lord Lethbridge, my Lady Rule!” said Crosby. “You perceive him quite agog to meet the lady about whom the whole town is talking, dear cousin.”
Horatia, spreading her skirts in a curtsy, flushed a little, for Mr Drelincourt’s words stung. She arose swimmingly and extended her hand. Lord Lethbridge received it on his wrist and bent with incomparable grace to salute it. A flicker of interest awoke in Horatia’s eyes: his lordship had an air.
“Our poor Crosby has always such a happy turn of phrase,” murmured Lethbridge, and won a glimpse of a dimple. “Ah, precisely! Let me lead you to that couch, madam.”
She took his arm and went with him across the saloon. “C-Crosby detests me,” she confided.
“But of course,” said his lordship.
She frowned, rather puzzled. “That isn’t very c-civil, sir. Why should he?”
His brows rose in momentary surprise; he looked critically at her, and laughed. “Oh—because he has such execrable taste, ma’am!”
It did not seem to Horatia as though this was the reason he really had in mind, and she was about to inquire deeper into the matter when he changed the subject. “I need hardly ask, ma’am, whether you are ennuyée to the point of extinction with such affairs as these?” he said, indicating with a wave of his hand the rest of the company.
“N-no, I am not,” replied Horatia. “I l-like it.”
“Delightful!” smiled his lordship. “You infect even such jaded spirits as mine with enthusiasm.