Lady Rose's Daughter Part 10

"She is half-way through it. I thought you knew."

"Well, upon my word! Whom shall we have a memoir of next? Henry Delafield! Henry Delafield! Good gracious!"

And Sir Wilfrid walked along, slas.h.i.+ng at the railings with his stick, as though the action relieved him. Julie Le Breton quietly resumed:

"I understand that Lord Henry and Captain Warkworth's father went through the Indian Mutiny together, and Captain Warkworth has some letters--"

"Oh, I dare say--I dare say," muttered Sir Wilfrid. "What's this man home for just now?"

"Well, I _think_ Lady Henry knows," said Mademoiselle Julie, turning to him an open look, like one who, once more, would gladly satisfy a questioner if they could. "He talks to her a great deal. But why shouldn't he come home?"

"Because he ought to be doing disagreeable duty with his regiment instead of always racing about the world in search of something to get his name up," said Sir Wilfrid, rather sharply. "At least, that's the view his brother officers mostly take of him."

"Oh," said Mademoiselle Julie, with amiable vagueness, "is there anything particular that you suppose he wants?"

"I am not at all in the secret of his ambitions," said Sir Wilfrid, lifting his shoulders. "But you and Lady Henry seemed well acquainted with him."

The straw-colored lashes veered her way.

"I had some talk with him in the Park this morning," said Julie Le Breton, reflectively. "He wants me to copy his father's letters for Lady Henry, and to get her to return the originals as soon as possible. He feels nervous when they are out of his hands."

"Hm!" said Sir Wilfrid.

At that moment Lady Henry's door-bell presented itself. The vigor with which Sir Wilfrid rang it may, perhaps, have expressed the liveliness of his unspoken scepticism. He did not for one moment believe that General Warkworth's letters had been the subject of the conversation he had witnessed that morning in the Park, nor that filial veneration had had anything whatever to say to it.

Julie Le Breton gave him her hand.

"Thank you very much," she said, gravely and softly.

Sir Wilfrid at the moment before had not meant to press it at all. But he did press it, aware the while of the most mingled feelings.

"On the contrary, you were very good to allow me this conversation.

Command me at any time if I can be useful to you and Lady Henry."

Julie Le Breton smiled upon him and was gone.

Sir Wilfrid ran down the steps, chafing at himself.

"She somehow gets round one," he thought, with a touch of annoyance. "I wonder whether I made any real impression upon her. Hm! Let's see whether Montresor can throw any more light upon her. He seemed to be pretty intimate. Her 'principles,' eh? A dangerous view to take, for a woman of that _provenance._"

An hour or two later Sir Wilfrid Bury presented himself in the Montresors' drawing-room in Eaton Place. He had come home feeling it essential to impress upon the cabinet a certain line of action with regard to the policy of Russia on the Persian Gulf. But the first person he perceived on the hearth-rug, basking before the Minister's ample fire, was Lord Lackington. The sight of that vivacious countenance, that shock of white hair, that tall form still boasting the spareness and almost the straightness of youth, that unsuspecting complacency, confused his ideas and made him somehow feel the whole world a little topsy-turvy.

Nevertheless, after dinner he got his fifteen minutes of private talk with his host, and conscientiously made use of them. Then, after an appointment had been settled for a longer conversation on another day, both men felt that they had done their duty, and, as it appeared, the same subject stirred in both their minds.

"Well, and what did you think of Lady Henry?" said Montresor, with a smile, as he lighted another cigarette.

"She's very blind," said Sir Wilfrid, "and more rheumatic. But else there's not much change. On the whole she wears wonderfully well."

"Except as to her temper, poor lady!" laughed the Minister. "She has really tried all our nerves of late. And the worst of it is that most of it falls upon that poor woman who lives with her"--the Minister lowered his voice--"one of the most interesting and agreeable creatures in the world."

Sir Wilfrid glanced across the table. Lord Lackington was telling scandalous tales of his youth to a couple of Foreign Office clerks, who sat on either side of him, laughing and spurring him on. The old man's careless fluency and fun were evidently contagious; animation reigned around him; he was the spoiled child of the dinner, and knew it.

"I gather that you have taken a friendly interest in Miss Le Breton,"

said Bury, turning to his host.

"Oh, the d.u.c.h.ess and Delafield and I have done our best to protect her, and to keep the peace. I am quite sure Lady Henry has poured out her grievances to you, hasn't she?"

"Alack, she has!"

"I knew she couldn't hold her tongue to you, even for a day. She has really been losing her head over it. And it is a thousand pities."

"So you think all the fault's on Lady Henry's side?"

The Minister gave a shrug.

"At any rate, I have never myself seen anything to justify Lady Henry's state of feeling. On the famous Wednesdays, Mademoiselle Julie always appears to make Lady Henry her first thought. And in other ways she has really worn herself to death for the old lady. It makes one rather savage sometimes to see it."

"So in your eyes she is a perfect companion?"

Montresor laughed.

"Oh, as to perfection--"

"Lady Henry accuses her of intrigue. You have seen no traces of it?"

The Minister smiled a little oddly.

"Not as regards Lady Henry. Oh, Mademoiselle Julie is a very astute lady."

A ripple from some source of secret amus.e.m.e.nt spread over the dark-lined face.

"What do you mean by that?"

"She knows how to help her friends better than most people. I have known three men, at least, _made_ by Mademoiselle Le Breton within the last two or three years. She has just got a fresh one in tow."

Sir Wilfrid moved a little closer to his host. They turned slightly from the table and seemed to talk into their cigars.

"Young Warkworth?" said Bury.

The Minister smiled again and hesitated.

"Oh, she doesn't bother me, she is much too clever. But she gets at me in the most amusing, indirect ways. I know perfectly well when she has been at work. There are two or three men--high up, you understand--who frequent Lady Henry's evenings, and who are her very good friends....

Oh, I dare say she'll get what she wants," he added, with nonchalance.

"Between you and me, do you suspect any direct interest in the young man?"