Stafford shook his head.
"No; I haven"t noticed "em particularly. In fact, I scarcely see them, or do more than exchange the usual greetings. They seem to me to move and look and speak just about as usual." Howard smiled.
"To be young and happy and free from care is to be blind: puppies, for instance, are blind!"
Stafford grinned.
"That"s complimentary, anyhow. What do you think is up?"
"I think Sir Stephen is going to pull off his great event, to make his grand _coup_," said Howard. "So you find a black-and-tan terrier improves a dress-coat by lying on it?"
Tiny had coiled himself up on that garment, which Measom had laid ready on the chair, and was lying apparently asleep, but with his large eyes fixed on his beloved master.
"Oh, he"s a peculiar little beast, and is always getting where he shouldn"t be. Hi! young man, get off my coat!"
He picked the terrier up and threw him softly on the bed, but Tiny got down at once and curled himself up on the fur mat by Stafford"s feet.
"Seems to be fond of you: strange dog!" said Howard. "Yes, I think Sir Stephen"s "little scheme"--as if any scheme of his could be "little"!--has worked out successfully, and I shouldn"t be surprised if the financiers had a meeting to-night and the floating of the company was announced."
"Oh," said Stafford, as he got into his coat. "Yes, I daresay it"s all right. The governor seems always to pull it off."
Howard smiled.
"You talk as if an affair of thousands of thousands, perhaps millions, were quite a bagatelle," he said. "My dear boy, don"t you understand, realise, the importance of this business? It"s nothing less than a railway from--"
Stafford nodded. "Oh, yes, you told me about it. It"s a very big thing, I daresay, but what puzzles me is why the governor should care to worry about it. He has money enough--"
"No man has money enough," said Howard, solemnly. "But no matter. It is a waste of time to discuss philosophy with a man who has no mind above fox-hunting, fishing, pheasant-shooting, and dancing. By the way, how many times do you intend to dance with the Grecian G.o.ddess?"
"Meaning--" said Stafford.
"Miss Falconer, of course. Grecian G.o.ddesses are not so common, my dear Stafford, as to permit of more than one in a house-party."
"I"m sure I don"t know," replied Stafford, eyeing him with faint surprise. "What the devil made you ask me that?"
Howard eyed the handsome face with cynical amus.e.m.e.nt.
"Pardon, if I was impertinent; but I a.s.sure you the question is being asked amongst themselves by all the women in the house--"
Stafford stared at him and began to frown with perplexity rather than anger.
"My dear Stafford, I know that you are not possessed of a particularly brilliant intellect, but you surely possess sufficient intelligence to see that your attentions to Miss Falconer are somewhat obvious."
"What?" said Stafford. "My attentions to Miss Falconer--Are you chaffing, Howard?"
"Not in the least: it"s usually too great a waste of time with you, my dear boy: you don"t listen, and when you do, half the time you don"t understand. No, I"m quite serious; but perhaps I ought to have said her attentions to you; it would have been more correct."
Stafford coloured.
"Look here, old man," he said. "If you think--Oh, dash it all, what nonsense it is! Miss Falconer and I are very good friends; and of course I like to talk to her--she"s so sharp, almost as smart and clever as you are, when she likes to take the trouble; and of course I like to hear her sing--Why, my dear Howard, it"s like listening to one of the big operatic swells; but--but to suggest that there is anything--that--there is any reason to warn me--Oh, dash it! come off it, old man, you"re chaffing?"
"Not in the least. But I didn"t intend any warning: in fact, I am in honour bound to refrain from anything of the kind--"
"In honour bound?" said Stafford.
Howard almost blushed.
"Oh, it"s nothing; only a silly wager," he said. "I can"t tell you, so don"t enquire. But all the same--well, there, I won"t say more if you are sure there is nothing between you."
"I have the best of reasons for saying so," said Stafford, carelessly, and with a touch of colour in his face. "But it"s all dashed nonsense!
The women always think there"s something serious going on if you dance twice with a girl, or sit and talk to her for half an hour."
"Right!" said Howard, rising. "There"s the bell!"
As Howard had said, there was an air of suppressed excitement about the people; and it was not confined to the financiers who cl.u.s.tered together in the hall and discussed and talked in undertones, every now and then glancing up the stairs down which Sir Stephen would presently descend. Most of the other guests, though they had no direct and personal interest in the great scheme, more or less had heard rumours and come within reflective radius of the excitement; as for the rest, who knew nothing or cared less for Sir Stephen"s railway, they were in a pleasant condition of excitement over the coming dance.
Stafford, as he stood in the hall talking about the night"s programme to Bertie--who had been elected, by common and tacit consent, master of the ceremonies--saw Maude Falconer descending the stairs. She was even more exquisitely dressed than usual; and Stafford heard some of the women and men murmur admiringly and enviously as she swept across the hall in her magnificent ball-dress; her diamonds, for which she was famous, glittering in her hair, on her white throat, and on her slender wrists. The dress was a mixture of grey and black, which would have looked _bizarre_ on anyone else less beautiful; but its strange tints harmonised with her superb and cla.s.sic cla.s.s of beauty, and she looked like a vision of loveliness which might well dazzle the eyes of the beholders.
She paused in her progress--it might almost be called a triumphant one, for the other women"s looks were eloquent of dismay--and looked at Stafford with the slow, half-dreamy smile which had come into her face of late when she spoke to him.
"Have you seen my father? Has he come down, Mr. Orme?" she asked.
"No," said Stafford. He looked at her, as a man does when he admires a woman"s dress, and forgetting Howard"s words of warning, said: "What a splendacious frock, Miss Falconer!"
"Do you like it? I am glad," she said. "I had my doubts, but now--"
Her eyes rested on his for a moment, then she pa.s.sed on.
"I shouldn"t like to have to pay Miss Falconer"s dress bill," remarked a young married woman, looking after her. "That "frock" as you call it, in your masculine ignorance, must have cost a small fortune."
Stafford laughed.
"We men always put our foot in it when we talk about a woman"s dress,"
he said.
A moment after, the dinner was announced, and Sir Stephen, who had come down at the last moment, as he went up to take in Lady Clansford, nodded to Stafford, and smiled significantly. He was as carefully dressed as usual, but on his face, and in his eyes particularly, was an expression of satisfaction and antic.i.p.atory triumph which was too obvious to escape the notice of but very few. He was not "loud" at dinner, but talked even more fluently than usual, and once or twice his fine eyes swept the long table with a victorious, masterful glance.
Directly the ladies had gone, the little knot of financiers drew up nearer to their host, and Griffenberg raised his eyebrows interrogatively.
Sir Stephen nodded.
"Yes," he said, in an undertone. "It"s all right! I heard this morning.
My man will be down, with the final decision, by a special train which ought to land him about midnight. We"ll meet in the library, say at half past twelve, and get the thing finished, eh, baron?"
Wirsch grunted approval.
"Vare goot, Sare Stephen; dee sooner a ting ees congluded, de bedder.
"Arf bast dwelve!"