f
kissing the Duchess of Westbury--at whose horrible party she had been
the other night--as herself.

She felt very safe, and enormously relieved. So much so that she could
afford herself the reflection that if hardihood had been all that was
wanting, Jimmy Urquhart would have had plenty and to spare. Oh, yes,
indeed. But--thank God again--he was a gentleman if ever there was
one. Nobody but a gentleman could afford to be so simple in dealing.

Having worked all this out, she felt that her feet at least were on
solid ground. A spirit of adventure was renewed in her, and a rather
unfortunate _contretemps_ provoked it. Before she knew where she was,
she was up to the neck, as Urquhart would have said, in a turbid
stream.

Francis Lingen, that elegant unfortunate, was certainly responsible,
if you could call one so tentative and clinging responsible for
anything. He had proposed the Flower Show, to which she had been, as
an earnest gardener, early in the morning, by herself, with a
note-book. She did not want to go with him at all; and moreover she
had an appointment to meet James at a wedding affair in Queen's Gate.
However, being ridiculously amiable where the pale-haired hectic was
concerned, go she did, and sat about at considerable length. He had
only cared to look at the sweet-peas, his passion of the hour, and
urged a chair upon her that he might the better do what he really
liked, look at her and talk about himself. So he did, and read her a
poem, and made great play with his tenderness, his dependence upon her
judgment and his crosses with the world. He pleaded for tea, which,
ordered, did not come; then hunted for the motor, which finally she
found for herself. She arrived late at Queen's Gate; the eyeglass
glared in horror. James, indeed, was very cross. What any chance
victim of his neighbourhood may have endured is not to be known. So
far as Lucy could see he did not open his mouth once while he was
there. He refused all nourishment with an angry gleam, and seemed
wholly bent upon making her self-conscious, uncomfortable and,
finally, indignant. Upon this goodly foundation he reared his mountain
of affront.

He made himself a monument of matter-of-fact impassivity during the
drive home. His arms were folded, he stared out of window; she thought
once she heard him humming an air. But he didn't smoke, as he
certainly would have done had relations been easy. He kept her at a
distance, but not aggressively.