“Anybody with her grace?” he inquired, as the man handed him over to the footman who was to usher him up-stairs.

“Only Miss Le Breton and Mr. Delafield, Sir Wilfrid.  Her grace told me to say ‘not at home’ this afternoon, but I am sure, sir, she will see you.”

Sir Wilfrid smiled.

As he entered the outer drawing-room, the Duchess and the group surrounding her did not immediately perceive the footman nor himself, and he had a few moments in which to take in a charming scene.

A baby girl in a white satin gown down to her heels, and a white satin cap, lace-edged and tied under her chin, was holding out her tiny skirt with one hand and dancing before the Duchess and Miss Le Breton, who was at the piano.  The child’s other hand held up a morsel of biscuit wherewith she directed the movements of her partner, a small black spitz, of a slim and silky elegance, who, straining on his hind legs, his eager attention fixed upon the biscuit, followed every movement of his small mistress; while she, her large blue eyes now solemn, now triumphant, her fair hair escaping from her cap in fluttering curls, her dainty feet pointed, her dimpled arm upraised, repeated in living grace the picture of her great-great-grandmother which hung on the wall in front of her, a masterpiece from Reynolds’s happiest hours.

Behind Mademoiselle Le Breton stood Jacob Delafield; while the Duchess, in a low chair beside them, beat time gayly to the gavotte that Mademoiselle Julie was playing and laughed encouragement and applause to the child in front of her.  She herself, with her cloud of fair hair, the delicate pink and white of her skin, the laughing lips and small white hands that rose and fell with the baby steps, seemed little more than a child.  Her pale blue dress, for which she had just exchanged her winter walking-costume, fell round her in sweeping folds of lace and silk—­a French fairy dressed by Woerth, she was possessed by a wild gayety, and her silvery laugh held the room.

Beside her, Julie Le Breton, very thin, very tall, very dark, was laughing too.  The eyes which Sir Wilfrid had lately seen so full of pride were now alive with pleasure.  Jacob Delafield, also, from behind, grinned applause or shouted to the babe, “Brava, Tottie; well done!” Three people, a baby, and a dog more intimately pleased with one another’s society it would have been difficult to discover.

“Sir Wilfrid!”

The Duchess sprang up astonished, and in a moment, to Sir Wilfrid’s chagrin, the little scene fell to pieces.  The child dropped on the floor, defending herself and the biscuit as best she could against the wild snatches of the dog.  Delafield composed his face in a moment to its usual taciturnity.  Mademoiselle Le Breton rose from the piano.

“No, no!” said Sir Wilfrid, stopping short and holding up a deprecating hand.  “Too bad!  Go on.”

“Oh, we were only fooling with baby!” said the Duchess.  “It is high time she went to her nurse.  Sit here, Sir Wilfrid.  Julie, will you take the babe, or shall I ring for Mrs. Robson?”