CHAPTER XXV
Finding Claude Rutherford the most agreeable person in a house full of people, Mrs. Bellenden took possession of him on the first evening—not with any obvious devices or allurements, but coolly and calmly, just as she possessed herself of the most becoming arm-chair in the drawing-room, with such an air of distinct appropriation that other women avoided it.
"You seem to be the only amusing person here," she said, as he came to her side after dinner. "Isn't it strange that in so small a party there should be such a prodigious amount of dullness?"
"Have you sampled all the people? There is Mr. Fitzallan over there, talking to Lady Waterbury, a musical genius, who sets Shakespeare's sonnets and Heine's ballads deliciously, and sings them delightfully. You can't call him dull."
"Not while he is singing—but I have heard all his songs."
"Ask him to sing presently, and you will find he has brought a new batch. Then there is Eustace Lyon, the poet."
Mrs. Bellenden smiled.
"Do you know what they say of him?" she asked.