The Goldsmiths were just finishing dinner when the expected ring came. To their surprise the ringer was Sidney. He was shown into the dining-room.
'Good-evening, all,' he said. 'I've come as a substitute for Raphael.'
Esther grew white.
'Why, what has happened to him?' she asked.
'Nothing. I had a wire to say he was unexpectedly detained in the City, and asking me to take Addie and to call for you.'
Esther turned from white to red. How rude of Raphael! How disappointing not to meet him after all! And did he think she could thus unceremoniously be handed over to somebody else? She was about to beg to be excused, when it struck her a refusal would look too pointed. Besides, she did not fear Sidney now. It would be a test of her indifference. So she murmured instead:
'What can detain him?'
'Charity, doubtless. Do you know that after he is fagged out with upholding the Flag from early morning till late eve, he devotes the later eve to gratuitous tuition, lecturing, and the like?'
'No,' said Esther, softened. 'I knew he came home late, but I thought he had to report communal meetings.'
'That too. But Addie tells me he never came home at all one night last week. He was sitting up with some wretched dying pauper.'