When old Gigleux had passed along the deck he sat down upon the bed and lighting a cigarette, reflected. He was a younger son with only seven hundred a year in addition to his pay from the Foreign Office. Madrid was an expensive post. Indeed, what European capital is not expensive to the men whose duty it is to keep up the prestige of the British Empire abroad? Diplomacy, save for the “plums,” is an ill-paid profession, for entertaining is a constant drain upon one’s pocket, as every Foreign Office official, from the poverty-stricken Consul to the Ambassador, harassed by debt, can, alas! testify.
Many an Ambassador to a foreign Court has been ruined by the constant drain of entertaining. Appearances and social entertainments are his very life, and if he cuts down his expenses Britain’s prestige must suffer, and at Downing Street they will quickly query the cause of his parsimony. So the old game goes on, and the truth is, that many a man of vast diplomatic experience and in a position of high responsibility is worse off in pocket than the average suburban tradesman.
Hubert Waldron bit his lip. After all, he was a fool to allow himself to think of her. No diplomat should marry until he became appointed Minister, and a bachelor life was a pleasant one. Curious, he thought, that he, a man who had run the whole gamut of life in the capitals, and who had met so many pretty and fascinating women in that gay world which revolves about the Embassies, should become attracted by that merry little French girl, Lola Duprez.
Breakfast over, the party went ashore again, now in linen clothes and sun-helmets, to wander about the temple till noon, when they were to leave for Wady Haifa.
He saw Lola and Edna Eastham walking with Chester Dawson, so, following, he joined them and at last secured an opportunity of speaking with Lola alone.
They were strolling slowly around the edge of the sandstone cliff, away from the colossal façade of the temple, and out of sight of the steamer, for the old Frenchman had fortunately still remained on board—the blazing heat being too much for him.
“Lola,” her companion exclaimed, “I have spoken to your uncle quite openly this morning. I know that he hates me.”
She turned quickly and looked straight at him with her wonderful dark eyes.
“Well—?” she asked.
“He has told me the truth,” Waldron went on seriously. “He has explained that the reason he objects to our companionship is because you are already betrothed.”