Lady Dargan here soothingly broke in, inquiring about Gaston's illness, and showing a tactful concern. But the nephew persisted:
"I say, Belward, Aunt Sophie was cut up no end when she heard of it. She wouldn't go out to dinner that night at Lord Dunfolly's, and, of course, I didn't go. And I wanted to; for Delia Gasgoyne was to be there, and she's ripping."
Lady Dargan, in spite of herself, blushed, but without confusion, and Gaston adroitly led the conversation otherwhere. Presently she said that they were to be at their villa in France during the late summer, and if he chanced to be abroad would he come? He said that he intended to visit his uncle in Paris, but that afterwards he would be glad to visit them for a short time.
She looked astonished. "With your uncle Ian!"
"Yes. He is to show me art-life, and all that."
She looked troubled. He saw that she wished to say something.
"Yes, Lady Dargan?" he asked.
She spoke with fluttering seriousness.
"I asked you once to come to me if you ever needed a friend. I do not wait for that. I ask you not to go to your uncle."
"Why?"