"Mrs. Delafield," said the Duchess.
"Mrs. Delafield, then"--the name was evidently a difficult mouthful--"seems to me a most undisciplined and unmanageable woman. Why does she look like a tragedy queen at her marriage? Jacob is twice too good for her, and she'll lead him a life. And how you can reconcile it to your conscience to have misled me so completely as you have in this matter, I really can't imagine."
"Misled you?" said Evelyn.
Her innocence was really a little hard to bear, and not even the beauty of her blue eyes, now happily restored to him, could appease the mentor at her side.
"You led me plainly to believe," he repeated, with emphasis, "that if I helped her through the crisis of leaving Lady Henry she would relinquish her designs on Delafield."
"Did I?" said the Duchess. And putting her hands over her face she laughed rather hysterically. "But that wasn't why you lent her the house, Freddie."
"You coaxed me into it, of course," said the Duke.
"No, it was Julie herself got the better of you," said Evelyn, triumphantly. "You felt her spell, just as we all do, and wanted to do something for her."
"Nothing of the sort," said the Duke, determined to admit no recollection to his disadvantage. "It was your doing entirely."
The Duchess thought it discreet to let him at least have the triumph of her silence, smiling, and a little sarcastic though it were.