‘Let me be cicerone,’ he said, ‘Renton, I know you are anxious to see to your business. Mrs. Rich will take me for her guide to the pictures for the moment. You know Mr. Ponsonby cannot wait, and you are losing time.’
‘If Mrs. Rich will excuse me,’ said Ben.
‘Oh, please don’t think of excuses; we can wait,’ said Millicent. ‘Mayn’t we wait to learn the news?’ and she clasped her hands softly, unseen of the bystanders, and gazed into his face. ‘Nobody,’ she murmured, lowering her voice, ‘can be more interested than I.’
‘So long as you can find anything to amuse you,’ said Ben, half frantic. ‘Hillyard, I confide it to you;’ and he had turned away, before any further dart could be thrown at him. Then there was a hurried consultation between Mrs. Renton and her sister-in-law. ‘I shall stay with them; never mind. Of course I am anxious too; but half-an-hour more or less don’t matter,’ Mrs. Westbury said, with the voice of a martyr; and when Millicent looked round she found herself standing alone with her own special party, Hillyard at her right hand, and Mrs. Westbury, with a smile of fixed politeness, behind. Ben was gone. He had made no answer to her appeal,—he had shown no inclination to linger by her side. She had put forth all her strength for this grand final coup, and it had failed.
‘I don’t think Mr. Renton has improved in politeness in his travels,’ she said to Hillyard, unable altogether to restrain the expression of her despite.
‘He has not been in polite regions,’ said Hillyard; ‘and everything, you know, must give place to business, now-a-days, even the service of ladies. You must forgive him, when you consider what it is——’
‘I have nothing to do with him,’ said Millicent, angrily. ‘I hope I never shall have anything to do with so rude a man;’ and then she paused, thinking she had gone too far. ‘You know it is not a way to treat an old friend——’
‘Poor Renton!’ said Hillyard. ‘He is so unlikely to be any the better for this anxiety, you know,—that is the worst of it; and I don’t think he has any hopes to speak of. He has made all his arrangements for going back to his work——’
‘You don’t say so!’ cried Mrs. Tracy, with a look at her daughter. ‘And I can’t believe it!’ cried Millicent.
‘But I assure you it is true. No one can know better than I, for I go with him,’ said Hillyard; ‘all our arrangements are made. But let me show you the pictures. This was Sir Anthony Renton, who was a—Master in Chancery in Queen Elizabeth’s time,’ pointing to a respectable merchant in snuff-coloured garments of the days of Queen Anne. But the visitors cared nothing for the family portraits, and Hillyard’s last shaft had told. If Ben was unlikely to have Renton, it was of no use spending more trouble upon him. They consulted together hastily for a moment, and then they turned their backs upon the pictures. ‘I have the pleasure to wish you good morning, Mrs. Westbury,’ said Mrs. Tracy. ‘Since our friends are so much occupied we will take our leave. Pray give Mrs. Renton my best sympathies.’