Morland looked pained.
“I don't like to hear you talk in that way about Jimmie,” he said reproachfully.
The little scornful curl appeared on her lip.
“Don't you?” was all she vouchsafed to say. Unreasonably irritated, she turned aside and caught a passing attache of the French Embassy. Morland, dismissed, sauntered off, and Norma went down to supper with the young Frenchman, who entertained her for half an hour with a technical description of his motor-car. And the trouble, he said, to keep it in order. It needed all the delicate cares of a baby. It was as variable as a woman.
“I know,” said Norma, stifling a yawn. “La donna e automobile.”
On the drive home in the hired brougham, whose obvious hiredom caused Norma such chafing of spirit, Mrs. Hardacre glowed with triumph, and while her husband dozed dejectedly opposite, she narrated her good fortunes. She had had her little chat with the duchess. They had spoken of Mr. Padgate, Charlie Sandys having run to show her his cuff immediately. The duchess looked favourably on the proposal. A friend of Mr. King's was a recommendation in itself. But the princess, she asseverated with ducal disregard of metaphor, had her own ideas of art and would not buy a pig in a poke. They must inspect Mr. Padgate's work before there was any question of commission. She would send Charlie Sandys to them to-morrow to talk over the necessary arrangements.
“I told her,” said Mrs. Hardacre, “that Mr. Padgate was coming to pay us a visit in any case in September, and suggested that he could drive over to Chiltern Towers every morning while the princess was honouring him with sittings, and paint the picture there. And she quite jumped at the idea.”
“No doubt,” said Norma, drily.
But her dryness had no withering effect on her mother's exuberance. The hard woman saw the goal of a life's ambition within easy reach, and for the exultant moment softened humanly. She chattered like a school-girl.
“And she took me up to the princess,” she said, “and presented me as her nearest country neighbour. Was n't that nice of her? And the princess is such a sweet woman.”