I assured His Grace that nothing like an appointment had been made; and all Lord Worcester had said on the subject, was a request to be allowed to call sometimes to pay his respects and make his bow.
I went to call on Fanny, after His Grace left me. Lord Alvanly and Amy were with her, and her eternal admirer, Baron Tuille, who told us that Lord Worcester did nothing but inquire of every man he met, whether they had heard anything relative to the departure of Leinster for Spain.
"That's a very fine young man, that Marquis of Worcester," said Amy. "I should like to be introduced to him, only I suppose Harriette, with her usual jealousy, will prevent me."
"On the contrary," said I, "Fanny heard me invite him to your party after the Opera, the very evening he was presented to me, and he refused to go."
"What a rude way of putting it," said Baron Tuille. "Why not say he was obliged to return to Oxford, and was en désespoir!"
"De tout mon coeur! Put it how you please," said I.
"I've some news for you," said Fanny. "Sophia has made a new conquest of an elderly gentleman in a curricle, with a coronet on it. He does nothing on earth from morning till night but drive up and down before Julia's door. Julia is quite in a passion about it, and says it looks so very odd."
"Talk of the devil," said Alvanly, as Julia and Sophia entered the room.
"Of fair Hebe rather," Baron Tuille observed.
"Well Miss Sophia, so you've made a new conquest?" said Fanny.