Mrs Richmond sniffed angrily.
"Get me some tea," said Denise, "and oh, here's Cyril."
The big man strolled across to his wife, handing her a telegram from a delayed guest.
"Nuisance," he said; "good shot, too."
"Oh! Lady Blakeney, I must show you my new pendant." Lucy Richmond forgot knickerbockers, and turned to a fresh subject. "One of those dear, old-fashioned, heavy things. Raleigh sent me to buy myself a birthday present, and it had just come in to Benhusan's."
Unfastening a clasp, she held the jewel out. Seeing it, Denise felt her colour ebb until she feared her cheeks must be deathly white. It was the pendant she had given to Esmé. Why had the woman chosen this moment?
"It's just like yours, Den"—Sir Cyril took the jewel in his big fingers—"exactly the same."
"I love these dear old-fashioned solid things," babbled Lucy Richmond. "As it was heavy, it wasn't so dear. Benhusan told me he had just bought it, but that they had made it originally themselves."
"Oh!" Sir Cyril sat down. "Yes. Bought it when, did you say?"
A bore is a person stocked with date and detail. Lucy Richmond loved a listener. How interesting she was, she felt, as she re-clasped the ugly pendant. Oh, on such a day—at such an hour.