“Well, I never did see such a manner—from one that knocks about like you!” cried Miss Henning. “I’m going to see a friend of mine—a lady’s-maid in Curzon Street. Have you anything to say to that?”
“Don’t tell us—don’t tell us!” Sholto interposed after she had spoken—and she had not, however slightly, hesitated. “I at least disavow the indiscretion. Where may not a charming woman be going when she trips with a light foot through the deepening dusk?”
“I say, what are you talking about?” the girl demanded with dignity of Hyacinth’s companion. She spoke as if with a resentful suspicion that her foot had not really been felt to be light.
“On what errand of mercy, on what secret ministration?” the Captain laughed.
“Secret yourself!” cried Millicent. “Do you two always hunt in couples?”
“All right, we’ll turn round and go with you as far as your friend’s,” Hyacinth said.
“All right,” Millicent replied.
“All right,” the Captain added; and the three took their way together in the direction of Curzon Street. They walked for a few moments in silence, though the Captain whistled, and then Millicent suddenly turned to Hyacinth.
“You haven’t told me where you were going yet, you know.”
“We met in that public-house,” the Captain said, “and were each so ashamed of being found in such a place by the other that we tumbled out together without much thinking what we should do with ourselves.”