"I want to come and see him, if I may," he said. "I asked him to come and lunch with me, but I suppose that is out of the question at present."
"You're right there," said Mrs. Lance in distinctly guarded tones. "He ain't what you'd call spry. He's not seeing anybody."
"I shouldn't stay long," urged Hughie.
"Is it business?" enquired Mrs. Gaymer with a touch of hostility.
"Yes," said Hughie.
Mrs. Gaymer surveyed him curiously. To most people she would have said flatly and untruthfully that her husband was unfit to see any one, for she had her own reasons for discouraging visitors to Balham just now. But she had always cherished a weakness for Hugh Marrable. He treated her exactly as he treated all women—with a scrupulous courtesy which, while it slightly bored frivolous damsels of his acquaintance, was appreciated at its true value by a lady whose social status was more than a little equivocal. It is only when one has secret doubts about being a real lady that one appreciates being treated as such.
"Could you come to-morrow?" she said at last.
"I have to get back to Manors to-night," said Hughie. "Might I come out to Balham this afternoon? Or, better still, will you come and lunch with me somewhere now, and we can drive out there afterwards? Or must you get back to the invalid?" he added, with just a suspicion of hopefulness.
Mrs. Lance, however, expressed her willingness to come and lunch, but insisted on being allowed to precede Hughie to Balham by at least one hour. The house was that untidy! she explained.
Accordingly Hughie, having decided in his mind upon an establishment where he would not be likely to encounter any of his own friends, and which would yet conform with Mrs. Gaymer's notions of what was sufficiently "classy," conveyed his fair charge thither in a hansom; and presently found himself engaged in that traditional ne plus ultra of dissipation—the entertainment of another man's wife to a meal in a public restaurant.