“Make yourself easy: he will not do so! You need do no more than bow to him, should you meet him at any time. It will be better you should do so, you know, for it would cause a deal of talk if you were to cut him. And mind this, Kitten! Not a word of this business to a soul!”
“No, I will not mention it,” she promised. “That is — he is paying particular attentions to Isabella, Sherry. Do you not think that I ought to warn her that he is not a proper person for her to know?”
“On no account in the world!” he said emphatically. “Isabella has her mother to keep an eye on her, and you may depend upon it Mrs Milborne has a very good notion of what Monty is! I wish to God you had a mother too!”
“Oh, but you keep an eye on me, Sherry, so it is of no consequence!” she assured him.
“Yes, it is,” he said. “I’m not a female, so how the deuce should I guess what you will be up to next? It is a thousand pities my own mother don’t take a fancy to you!”
So far from taking a fancy to her daughter-in-law, the dowager had been solacing herself for the past two months with the task of collecting and brooding over all the indiscretions committed by Hero which were known to the world at large. By some mysterious means she had contrived to discover her son’s predeliction for deep play at unsavoury gaming hells, and had actually put herself to the trouble of visiting Hero for the purpose of impressing upon her that such excesses had been unknown to poor Anthony before his marriage had wrecked his life. Hero was quite overpowered, but the dowager arose from the session much refreshed and went away to tell her sympathetic brother that if the worst came to the worst, at least she had told Hero what she thought of her behaviour. After that, and finding that her friends were disinclined to listen to a repetition of her troubles, she withdrew again to Sheringham Place, and the house in Grosvenor Square was once more swathed in holland covers.
Hero, meanwhile, having spent an enjoyable morning buying clothes for Ruth’s baby, greatly exasperated her husband by electing to escort this unfortunate young female down to Melton for the purpose of installing her in her new home, and making her known to the Gorings. So the Viscount, returning to his house in good time to accompany his wife to a dinner-party, was met by the pleasing intelligence that her ladyship had gone into the country with Mrs Wimborne, and would not be back until the following evening. It was apparent, from the hurried note Hero had left him, that she had forgotten all about the dinner-party; so the Viscount was obliged to create on the spot an aged relative on the distaff side of Hero’s family, to endow this mythical person with the feeblest of health, to lay her low upon her deathbed, and thus to account for his wife’s precipitate departure from town.
It was more than a week later before he met Sir Montagu under circumstances which permitted of private conversation, and Sir Montagu did not avail himself of the opportunity to take his young friend into his confidence. He had, instead, an amusing history to recount, and a successful day at the races to describe. Sherry, for once impervious to his charm, heard him with rising impatience, and presently broke in on his talk to say bluntly: “Yes, I dare say, but about that affair the other night, Monty — !”
Sir Montagu’s brows rose. “What affair, my dear boy?”
“Outside Almack’s of course! You know — ”