“Of course, I wish to adhere to the convenances!” she answers, rather sullenly.
“Well, we won’t talk now. When may I call and see you?”
She hesitates, evidently. It may be that her time is not her own. Then suddenly she changes her mind.
“Come with me now, Delaval! I am sure you were only going for a prowl down Regent Street, and I am rather curious to hear what you want to talk about—come in.”
He puts a foot on the step, then pauses.
“But how about the convenances? Everyone doesn’t know that I am not one of your lovers!”
“Bother the convenances,” she cries, impatiently, “and everyone knows I have no lovers.”
He enters the brougham, and a few in the crowd, who know the lovely golden-haired woman by sight as one of the London belles, begin to chatter about her. Different versions and interpretations of the matter fly from lip to lip, the favourite rendition being a modified version of “Auld Robin Gray.”
“She married old Peter Stubbs, the millionaire, against her will, you know,” Bevan, a man in the Coldstreams, tells a pretty coquettish little woman who stands beside him on the steps of the Burlington Arcade. “She was over head and ears in love with Conway, the actor.”
“I know Carlton Conway,” little Mrs. De Clifford answers. “I met him last night at Flora Fitzallan’s supper. He was quite the host there. Flora has loved him slavishly for years, and though he spends all her money, he tyrannises over her awfully. I suppose that wonderfully handsome fellow is another lover of Mrs. Stubbs’,” she adds, with a lingering look at Delaval’s undeniable beauty.