Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 1.djvu/47

Rh "Oh, mamma!" Grace protested.

"It's all very well to say that in public life money isn't necessary, as it used to be," her ladyship went on, broodingly.

"Those who say so don't know anything about it. It's always necessary."

Her daughter was visibly affected by the gloom of her manner, and felt impelled to evoke, as a corrective, a more cheerful idea. "I dare say; but there's the fact—isn't there? that poor papa had so little."

"Yes, and there's the fact that it killed him!"

These words came out with a strange, quick little flare of passion. They startled Grace Dormer, who jumped in her place and cried, "Oh, mother!" The next instant, however, she added, in a different voice, "Oh, Peter!" for, with an air of eagerness, a gentleman was walking up to them.

"How'd'ye do, Cousin Agnes? How'd'ye do, little Grace?" Peter Sherringham said, laughing and shaking hands with them; and three minutes later he was settled in his chair at their table, on which the first elements of the repast had been placed. Explanations, on one side and the other, were demanded and produced; from which it appeared that the two parties had been in some degree at cross-purposes. The day before Lady Agnes and her companions travelled to Paris, Sherringham had gone to London for forty-eight hours, on private business of the ambassador's, arriving, on his return by the night-train, only early that morning. There had accordingly been a delay in his receiving Nick Dormer's two notes. If Nick had come to the Embassy in person (he might have done him the honour to call), he would have learned