"are an exception to
all rules. No, you are a rule by yourself."

"To revert to the subject then for a moment," the Duchess said stiffly.
"You have made no progress with the Duke?"

"None whatever," Saxe Leinitzer admitted. "He was sufficiently emphatic
to inspire me with every caution. Even now I have doubts as to whether
I have altogether reassured him. I really believe, dear Duchess, that we
should be better off if you could persuade him to go and live upon his
estates."

The Duchess smiled grimly.

"Whilst the House of Lords exists," she remarked, "you will never
succeed in keeping Algernon away from London. He is always on the point
of making a speech, although he never does it."

"I have heard of that speech," Lady Carey drawled, from her low seat.
"It is to be a thoroughly enlightening affair. All the great social
questions are to be permanently disposed of. The Prime Minister will
come on his knees and beg Algernon to take his place."

The Duchess looked up over her knitting.

"Algernon is at least in earnest," she remarked drily. "And he has the
good conscience of a clean living and honest man."

"What an unpleasant possession it must be," Lady Carey remarked sweetly.
"I disposed of my conscience finally many years ago. I am not sure, but
I believe that it was the Prince to whom I entrusted the burying of it.
By the bye, Lucille will be here directly, I suppose. Is she to be told
of Souspennier's arrival in London?"

"I imagine," the Prince said, with knitted brows, "that it will not be
wise to keep it from her. It is impossible to conceal her whereabouts,
and the papers will very shortly acquaint her with his."

"And," Lady Carey asked, "how does the little affair progress?"

"Admirably," the Prince answered. "Already some of the Society papers
are beginning to chatter about the friendship existing between a Cabinet
Minister and a beautiful Hungarian lady of title, etc., etc. The fact of
it is that Brott is in deadly earnest. He gives himself away every time.
If Lucille has not lost old cleverness she will be able to twist him
presently around her little finger."

"If only some one would twist him on the rack," the Duchess murmured
vindictively. "I tried to read one of his speeches the other day. It was
nothing more nor less than blasphemy. I do not think that I am naturally
a cruel woman, but I would hand such men over to the public executioner
with joy."

Lucille came in, as beautiful as ever