"I was so glad to hear that, too."
"Thanks." There was a slight spasm in his throat. That thick difficult word stuck in it and choked him for the moment.
"I hope I shall meet your wife some day."
"You have met her." Lucia looked puzzled and he smiled, a little sadly for a bridegroom. "You sat next her at dinner. She's here somewhere."
Lucia turned her head to where Flossie was sitting by a table, sitting very upright, with her little air of strained propriety.
"Is it—is it that pretty lady? Do you think I might go up and speak to her? I would so like to know her."
"I'll bring her to you. There's rather a crowd just now in the other room."
He went to her, hardly knowing how he went.
"Flossie," he said, "I want to introduce you to Miss Harden."
Flossie's eyes brightened with surprise and pleasure; for she had learnt from Mrs. Downey that the visitor was the daughter of Sir Frederick Harden; and Lucia's distinction subdued her from afar. Keith, being aware of nothing but Lucia, failed to perceive, as he otherwise might have done, that he had risen in Flossie's opinion by his evident intimacy with Miss Harden. She came blushing and smiling and a little awkward, steered by Keith. But for all her awkwardness she had never looked prettier than at that moment of her approach.