Naturally they exchanged greetings, and fell to chatting. While they were thus engaged the young brown-bearded man to whom Claudia had given a covert sign of recognition passed them.
“Do you happen to know that fellow’s name?” Chisholm asked, well aware that his friend was a popular figure in society and knew every one.
“What, the young fellow now speaking to Lady Meldrum? Oh, don’t you know? That’s the Grand-Duke Stanislas.”
“The Grand-Duke?” echoed the Under-Secretary, as the truth at once became apparent. No doubt he had watched them separate and was now on his way in search of her.
“And is that elderly woman with white hair Lady Meldrum? I’ve heard of her. Wife of a big iron-founder in Glasgow, isn’t she?”
“That’s so,” his friend answered. “But haven’t you met their ward, Muriel Mortimer? She was presented last year. Awfully pretty girl. There she is, in cream, sitting close by Lady Meldrum. You should know her. Let me introduce you. I’m an old friend of the family, you know, and she’s been wanting to know you for ever so long.”
At first he held back, declaring that he had to return to the House before it rose; but the Member for South Staffordshire would take no refusal, and a moment later the Under-Secretary found himself bowing before a fair-haired girl with a sweet, innocent-looking face, dimpled cheeks that blushed slightly as he was introduced, and a pair of large wide-open blue eyes that looked out upon him in wonder.
About twenty-two he judged her to be, fragile, pretty, almost childlike in her artless grace. Her complexion was perfect, and her rather plainly made toilette of cream chiffon suited her beauty admirably. Indeed, demure and rather shy, she seemed out of place in that crowd of the more brilliant butterflies of fashion.
A moment before, Dudley Chisholm had turned away from the dancers and had intended to drive down to the House in order to while away the rest of the night, but now this resolution was forgotten, because he had at once become interested in the girl with whom he had just made acquaintance, and all the more so when he recollected the colonel’s strange warning down at Wroxeter. He was bending towards her, speaking in commonplaces, reflecting the while that there certainly was nothing in her outward appearance to cause him terror.
And yet the colonel had prophesied correctly in regard to their meeting and had warned him to avoid her. Why? The mystery underlying the words of his friend was certainly remarkable.