'Lord Mountry—Miss Drassilis,' said Mrs Ford.
'I'm afraid we're driving Lord Mountry away,' said the girl. Her eyes seemed to his lordship larger, greyer, cooler, more amused, and more contemptuous than ever. He floundered in them like an unskilful swimmer in deep waters.
'No, no,' he stammered. 'Give you my word. Just going. Good-bye.
You won't forget to let me know about the yacht, Mrs Ford—what?
It'll be an awfully jolly party. Good-bye, good-bye, Miss
Drassilis.'
He looked at Ogden for an instant, as if undecided whether to take the liberty of addressing him too, and then, his heart apparently failing him, turned and bolted. From down the corridor came the clatter of a dropped stick.
Cynthia Drassilis closed the door and smiled.
'A nervous young person!' she said. 'What was he saying about a yacht, Nesta?'
Mrs Ford roused herself from her fascinated contemplation of
Ogden.
'Oh, nothing. Some of us are going to the south of France in his yacht next week.'
'What a delightful idea!'
There was a certain pensive note in Cynthia's voice.