"A dull, prosy, platitudinous old Polonius; as for the girl, she's just a badly behaved, unformed, bread-and-butter miss."
Dick did not speak. The Count's words grated on him.
"By the way," went on Romanoff, "I should like to meet Lady Blanche Huntingford. I think I knew the old Lord."
"I promised to call to-morrow afternoon," replied Dick. "I'll take you over." But he was not so enthusiastic as the Count expected.
After they had retired to their rooms that night, the Count sat long in soliloquy. Of what he was thinking it would be difficult to say. His face was like a mask.
When he rose from his chair, however, there was a look of decision in his eyes.
"The time has come sooner than I thought," he said aloud. "I must bring the matter to a head at once. Otherwise I shall lose him."
And then he laughed in his grim, sardonic way, as if something had made him merry.