Page:The Duke Decides (1904).djvu/75

 “I’m afraid that your Grace has hurt your hand,” said the Senator’s wife, pointing to a broad strip of diachylon plaster that ran from the Duke’s wrist to the ball of his thumb.

“Yes, I—I grazed it rather badly against the wheel in getting out of a cab,” Beaumanoir replied with a momentary loss of his self-possession. The discomposure passed at once, and only the observer on the hearth-rug noticed it. The same shrewd observer presently perceived that the visitor was definitely leading the conversation to the subject of the arrival in England of Senator Sherman; and, more than that, that he was waxing a shade more inquisitive than good-breeding allowed as to the nature of the senatorial journey.

“Ah! he’s coming on political business, I think you told me?” the Duke remarked in a half-tone of interrogation on Leonie saying that her father, according to advices received that morning, was to sail in two days’ time on the Campania, and would be due at Liverpool early in the following week.

“Well, it’s political business in a way,” Mrs. Sherman struck in. “My husband is coming over in charge of a large amount of Government securities, which are to be deposited at