“What did that person want?” asked Eve, sharply.
“She brought a letter for my master, ma’am.”
“Where is it? Give it to me.”
She took the letter, and looked at it frowningly.
“Mr. Vansetart!” The woman could not even spell his name, and yet was able to darken his wife’s existence.
“What a shabby letter!” cried Sophy, struggling with the top button of a tight glove. “It must be a begging letter, I should think. But what a pretty dark-eyed woman that was. I seem to remember her face. Really, really, Eve, we shall be late! Mrs. Montford told us her luncheons are always punctual. She wouldn’t wait for a Bishop.”
Eve was staring at the letter. Vansittart was out, or she would have gone to him with it. She wanted to put it into his hands, and to see how he took its contents; but she did not even venture to keep the letter in her possession till they met. She ran into her husband’s study, and put the odious letter on the mantelpiece, in a spot where he might overlook it. If it were overlooked until the afternoon she might be with him when he opened it.
She went into society with her heart aching. Whatever her husband’s feelings might be, this shameless Italian was running after him. What insolence! What consummate audacity! To come to his house, to pursue him with letters, even in his wife’s presence! And Sefton had introduced this brazen creature to her; and she—Vansittart’s wife—had been weak enough to be civil.
Sophy’s perpetual prattle agonized her all the way to Grosvenor Gardens; nor was the smart luncheon which awaited them there less agonizing. She had to brace herself for the ordeal, to smile and talk, and laugh at good stories, pretending to see the point of them; laughing when other people laughed; pretending to enjoy that happy mixture of society to be met at some hospitable tables—a dash of literature and art, a fashionable priest and a fashionable actor, an archæological Dean from a grave old Midland city, a young married beauty, a Primrose League enthusiast, a foreign diplomatist, and a sporting peer owning a handsome slice of the shires.
Mr. Sefton came in after they were seated, and dropped into the one vacant chair beside Sophy.