Lady Adela looked at him, and sighed a little impatiently. He was incredibly young and might, after all, let them down.
He was thirty now, but he looked not a day more than nineteen, and he always talked and behaved as though he were still in his last year at Eton. She opposed him, in her mind's eye, to that figure of Frank Breton that had been before her all day. How could a mere boy stand up against a scoundrel like that?
Moreover, she had heard stories about Roddy. Women had terrible power over him, she had been told, and then, with a glance at him, sighed again at the thought that her own time had gone by for having power over anybody, even Lord Crewner.
Well, after all, her mother knew the boy better than anyone did and her mother loved him—better than everyone else put together her mother loved him.
"How's Rachel takin' it?"
"How does Rachel take anything? She never says anything, and one never knows. She seems to have no curiosity, or eagerness."
"I was talkin' to May Eversley about her the other night. May says she'll be splendid."
"I don't like May Eversley"—Lady Adela nervously moved her hands on her lap. "I wish Rachel hadn't made such friends with her in Munich."
"Oh, May's all right." Roddy's blue eyes were smiling. "Took her down to Hurlingham yesterday and we had no end of a time."
It was a pity, Lady Adela reflected, that Roddy was so absolutely on his own.