'I dare say.'
'Dare say! But there's no dare say about it. It's a question of fact. And, by George, that Jimmy of yours, he's a Marquis too.'
'So Miss Desmond says.'
'She does, does she? And Pollie, she's the Lady Pollie. Why, you've got a room full of titles, and I'm the only common person in it. I'm not accustomed to having intimate relations with the upper circles, so you'll have to excuse me if my manners fall short of what they ought to be. Talk of the romance of the stage. Nothing I ever heard of in that line comes within shouting distance of this. To think of you having been a Marchioness all these years and never knowing it! And such a Marchioness too! None of your pauper peeresses who have to introduce American young women to the Queen in order to make two ends meet, but the real, gilt-edged, rolling-in-riches, house-in-Grosvenor Square kind. Why, I have heard that the income of the Marquis of Twickenham is over a hundred thousand pounds a year, all profit--besides plenty of perquisites. That's better than being a Star of the Halls.'
He was silent; I expect because he was turning things over in his mind.
'I remember now reading about the Marquis of Twickenham's being rather a funny lot, and I've a sort of notion that I did hear that no one knew where he was. So Babbacombe was he! Well, tastes do differ. And without wanting to know too much about what caused him to turn up, being a Marquis, I can only say that it would have wanted a lot to have made me take to the game of Wonderful Sleeping Man instead. Between a real live Marquis and even a Marvel of the Age there is a difference.'
Another pause. I seemed to hear him talking to me like a person in a dream.
'Well, Marchioness--I don't know if that's the proper way in which to address a lady in your position, but if it isn't you'll have to excuse me till I do know--you are now one of the greatest ladies in the land, and I shall have to behave to you as such. As for my lord the Marquis, I shall have to mind my p's and q's with a vengeance when I'm talking to him. I suppose he'll give up his taste for hardbake, and won't look at anything under chocolate creams. Which is a pity--because I happen to have some hardbake in my pocket at this very moment--My Lord Marquis!' Spoken to like that, Jimmy wouldn't go. 'Pardon me if I'm over familiar just this once, but--Jimmy!'
Jimmy went. Mr. FitzHoward was mistaken if he really did think hardbake wasn't good enough; because Pollie and the boy began to get rid of what he gave them in a style which I knew meant sticky fingers and dirty faces.
'There is only one remark, my dear Marchioness--if you'll allow me to make so bold as to call you so--which I wish to make, and that is that it's a pretty sure thing that you'll do honour to the high position to which you have so suddenly been called. You'll look the part just as well as you will act it, And if there's any woman who's more worthy of being the great lady than you are, I've yet to come across her. In a man who's had such a varied experience of the profession as I have had, that's saying something, as you know.'