“But, George, what brings you here?” asked Hero, smiling mischievously up at him. “It is not at all the sort of place for you! They do not allow hazard in the Rooms, you know, and nobody waltzes, so how will you go on?”
“I know: deuced slow place!” George agreed. “But I did not come for that! Kitten — Lady Sheringham, I mean” — he corrected himself, a guilty eye on Lady Saltash.
“No, no, don’t call me that! I am known as Miss Wantage here, but please call me Kitten! It seems so long since anyone did!” Hero said, a catch in her voice.
He pressed her hand in a very feeling manner. “But you are well? You are tolerably comfortable?”
“Yes, indeed! Dear Lady Saltash has been so kind! But you have not told me why you are here?”
“Kitten, it’s the deuce of a coil, and I did not know what you would wish me to do! Gil must needs go off to Melton, just when he was most wanted, and there was no sense in consulting Ferdy.”
“George, nothing has happened to Sherry?” Hero cried.
“No, nothing. But he is even now upon his way here!”
Such a light sprang to her eyes, such a vivid colour into her cheeks that if he could have brought Sherry into her presence there and then he would have done it. “To — find — me, George?” she faltered, looking beseechingly at him.
He was obliged to shake his head. There was a long silence. Hero broke it. “No. I quite see. But — but it seems very odd of Sherry to be coming here, if it is not for that, because he cannot bear Bath.”