“She has temperament,” said Cicely, with the decision of one who makes a vague statement in a good cause.
“So Laurent says,” observed Tony. “He discovers temperament in every one that he intends to boom. He told me that I had temperament to the finger-tips, and I was too polite to contradict him. But I haven’t told you the really important thing about the Mustelford début. It is a profound secret, more or less, so you must promise not to breathe a word about it till half-past four, when it will appear in all the six o’clock newspapers.”
Tony paused for dramatic effect, while he drained his goblet, and then made his announcement.
“Majesty is going to be present. Informally and unofficially, but still present in the flesh. A sort of casual dropping in, carefully heralded by unconfirmed rumour a week ahead.”
“Heavens!” exclaimed Cicely, in genuine excitement, “what a bold stroke. Lady Shalem has worked that, I bet. I suppose it will go down all right.”
“Trust Laurent to see to that,” said Tony, “he knows how to fill his house with the right sort of people, and he’s not the one to risk a fiasco. He knows what he’s about. I tell you, it’s going to be a big evening.”
“I say!” exclaimed Ronnie suddenly, “give a supper party here for Gorla on the night, and ask the Shalem woman and all her crowd. It will be awful fun.”
Cicely caught at the suggestion with some enthusiasm. She did not particularly care for Lady Shalem, but she thought it would be just as well to care for her as far as outward appearances went.
Grace, Lady Shalem, was a woman who had blossomed into sudden importance by constituting herself a sort of foster-mother to the fait accompli. At a moment when London was denuded of most of its aforetime social leaders she had seen her opportunity, and made the most of it. She had not contented herself with bowing to the inevitable, she had stretched out her hand to it, and forced herself to smile graciously at it, and her polite attentions had been reciprocated. Lady Shalem, without being a beauty or a wit, or a grand lady in the traditional sense of the word, was in a fair way to becoming a power in the land; others, more capable and with stronger claims to social recognition, would doubtless overshadow her and displace her in due course, but for the moment she was a person whose good graces counted for something, and Cicely was quite alive to the advantage of being in those good graces.
“It would be rather fun,” she said, running over in her mind the possibilities of the suggested supper-party.