"No--n.o.body but me." She threw her many-tailed boa on the back of the chair that Paul Filey had drawn up for her between the hostess and the place where Borrodaile had been sitting.
"There are two more good trains before dinner----" began Lord John.
"Oh, didn"t I tell you," said his wife, as she gave the cup just filled for the new-comer into the nearest of the outstretched hands--"didn"t I tell you I had a note from Mrs. Freddy by the afternoon post? They aren"t coming."
Out of a little chorus of regret, came Borrodaile"s slightly mocking, "Anything wrong with the precious children?"
"She didn"t mention the children--nor much of anything else--just a hurried line."
"The children were as merry as grigs yesterday," said Vida, looking at their uncle across the table. "I went on to the Freddys" after the Royal Academy. No!" she put her cup down suddenly. "n.o.body is to ask me how I like my own picture! The Tunbridge children----"
"That thing Hoyle has done of you," said Lord Borrodaile, deliberately, "is a very brilliant and a very misleading performance."
"Thank you."
Filey and Lord John, in spite of her interdiction, were pursuing the subject of the much-discussed portrait.
"It certainly is one aspect of you----"
"Don"t you think his Velasquez-like use of black and white----"
"The tiny Tunbridges, as I was saying," she went on imperturbably, "were having a teafight when I got there. I say "fight" advisedly."
"Then I"ll warrant," said their uncle, "that Sara was the aggressor."
"She was."
"You saw Mrs. Freddy?" asked Lady John, with an interest half amused, half cynical, in her eyes.
"For a moment."
"She doesn"t confess it, I suppose," the hostess went on, "but I imagine she is rather perturbed;" and Lady John glanced at Borrodaile with her good-humoured, worldly-wise smile.
"Poor Mrs. Freddy!" said Vida. "You see, she"s taken it all quite seriously--this Suffrage nonsense."
"Yes;" Mrs. Freddy"s brother-in-law had met Lady John"s look with the same significant smile as that lady"s own--"Yes, she"s naturally feeling rather crestfallen--perhaps she"ll _see_ now!"
"Mrs. Freddy crestfallen, what about?" said Farnborough. But he was much preoccupied at that moment in supplying Lady Sophia with bits of toast the exact size for balancing on the Bedlington"s nose. For the benefit of his end of the table Paul Filey had begun to describe the new one-man show of caricatures of famous people just opened in Bond Street. The "mordant genius," as he called it, of this new man--an American Jew--offered an irresistible opportunity for phrase-making. And still on the other side of the tea urn the Ullands were discussing with Borrodaile and Miss Levering the absent lady whose "case" was obviously a matter of concern to her friends.
"Well, let us hope," Lord John was saying as sternly as his urbanity permitted--"let us hope this exhibition in the House will be a lesson to her."
"_She_ wasn"t concerned in it!" Vida quickly defended her.
"Nevertheless we are all hoping," said Lady John, "that it has come just in time to prevent her from going over the edge."
"Over the edge!" Farnborough p.r.i.c.ked up his ears at last in good earnest, feeling that the conversation on the other side had grown too interesting for him to be out of it any longer. "Over what edge?"
"The edge of the Woman Suffrage precipice," said Lady John.
"You call it a precipice?" Vida Levering raised her dark brows in a little smile.
"Don"t you?" demanded her hostess.
"I should say mud-puddle."
"From the point of view of the artist"--Paul Filey had begun laying down some new law, but turning an abrupt corner, he followed the wandering attention of his audience--"from the point of view of the artist," he repeated, "it would be interesting to know what the phenomenon is, that Lady John took for a precipice and that Miss Levering says is a mud-puddle."
"Oh," said Lord John, thinking it well to generalize and spare Mrs.
Freddy further rending, "we"ve been talking about this public demonstration of the unfitness of women for public affairs."
"Give me some more toast dice!" Sophia said to Farnborough. "You haven"t seen Joey"s new accomplishment. They"re only discussing that idiotic scene the women made the other night."
"Oh, in the gallery of the House of Commons?"
"Yes, wasn"t it disgustin"?" said Paul Filey, facing about suddenly with an air of cheerful surprise at having at last hit on something that he and Lady Sophia could heartily agree about.
"Perfectly revolting!" said Hermione Heriot, not to be out of it. For it is well known that, next to a great enthusiasm shared, nothing so draws human creatures together as a good bout of cursing in common. So with emphasis Miss Heriot repeated, "Perfectly revolting!"
Her reward was to see Paul turn away from Sophia and say, in a tone whose fervour might be called marked--
"I"m glad to hear you say so!"
She consolidated her position by asking sweetly, "Does it need saying?"
"Not by people like you. But it _does_ need saying when it comes to people we know----"
"Like Mrs. Freddy. Yes."
That unfortunate little lady seemed to be "getting it" on all sides.
Even her brother-in-law, who was known to be in reality a great ally of hers--even Lord Borrodaile was chuckling as though at some reflection distinctly diverting.
"Poor Laura! She was being unmercifully chaffed about it last night."
"I don"t myself consider it any longer a subject for chaff," said Lord John.
"No," agreed his wife; "_I_ felt that before this last outbreak. At the time of the first disturbance--where was it?--in some town in the North several weeks ago----"
"Yes," said Vida Levering; "I almost think that was even worse!"
"Conceive the sublime impertinence," said Lady John, "of an ignorant little factory girl presuming to stand up in public and interrupt a speech by a minister of the Crown!"
"I don"t know what we"re coming to, I"m sure!" said Borrodaile, with a detached air.
"Oh, _that_ girl--beyond a doubt," said his host, with conviction--"that girl was touched."
"Oh, beyond a doubt!" echoed Mr. Farnborough.
"There"s something about this particular form of feminine folly----"
began Lord John.