“I don’t know what you mean; but, if what she says is true, it is wickeder, any way. You do not say that it is all false about his banquets to the aristocracy, his royal receptions? What about the Prince of Wales, then, and Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone and the Poet Laureate visiting him? And his garden parties and the illuminations at night, parterres of flowers mixed up with colored lamps, his collections of rhododendrons and his military bands?”
“Were you ever at a Botanical Fête in Regent’s Park?” I asked.
“I have never crossed the Atlantic.”
“Your little English friend evidently knows the Botanical well.”
“She is acquainted with everything and everybody in London. I wish she were here now. Perhaps she knows a little more than some of Mr. Irving’s friends care to admit.”
“Does she know Mr. Irving?”
“She knows his house.”
“By the Lake of Como?”
“No, sir; by the Thames.”