"If only she would look as if she cared for me, Tommy," he bemoaned to Ladds.
"Hang it! can't expect a girl to begin making eyes at you."
"Eyes! Phillis make eyes! Tommy, as you grow older you grow coarser. It's a great pity. That comes of this club life. Always smoking and playing cards."
Tommy grinned. Virtue was as yet a flower new to Jack Dunquerque's buttonhole, and he wore it with a pride difficult to dissemble.
"Better go and have it out with Colquhoun," Tommy advised. "He won't care. He's taken up with his old flame, Mrs. Cassilis, again. Always dangling at her heels, I'm told. Got no time to think of Miss Fleming. Great fool, Colquhoun. Always was a fool, I believe. Might have gone after flesh and blood instead of a marble statue. Wonder how Cassilis likes it."
"There you go," cried Jack impatiently. "Men are worse than women. At Twickenham one never hears this foolish sort of gossip."
"Suppose not. Flowers and music, muffins, tea, and spoons. Well, the girl's worth it, Jack; the more flowers and music you get the better it will be for you. But go on and square it with Colquhoun."
CHAPTER XXVI.
"A right royal banquet."
At seven o'clock on the great Wednesday Gilead Beck was pacing restlessly in his inner room, the small apartment which formed his sanctum, waiting to receive his guests. All the preparations were complete: a quartette of singers was in readiness, with a piano, to discourse sweet music after the dinner; the noblest bouquet ever ordered at the Langham was timed for a quarter to eight punctually; the wine was in ice; the waiters were adding the last touches to the artistic decorations of a table which, laid for thirteen only, might have been prepared for the Prince of Wales. In fact, when the bill came up a few days later, even Gilead Beck, man of millions, quailed for a moment before its total. Think of the biggest bill you ever had at Vèfour's—for francs read pounds, and then multiply by ten; think of the famous Lord Warden bill for the Emperor Napoleon when he landed in all his glory, and then consider that the management of the Langham is in no way behind that of the Dover hostelry. But this was to come, and when it did come, was received lightly.