Mailing was in doubt.  Why not follow Stepton’s advice?  Why not study Lady Sophia?

He resolved to do it.  And with the resolve came to him a sense of greater well-being.  The worm-sensation departed from him.  He lifted his head and walked more briskly.

V

On the night following the dinner in Hornton Street, Malling went to the Covent Garden Opera House to hear “La Traviata.”  The well-worn work did not grasp the attention of a man who was genuinely fond of the music of Richard Strauss, with its almost miraculous intricacies, and who was willingly captive to Debussy.  He looked about the house from his stall, and very soon caught sight of Lady Mansford, Lady Sophia’s sister-in-law, in a box on the Grand Tier.  Malling knew Lady Mansford.  He resolved to pay her a visit, and as soon as the curtain was down, and Tetrazzini had tripped before it, smiling not unlike a good-natured child, he made his way upstairs, and asked the attendant to tap at a door on which was printed, “The Earl of Mansford.”  The man did so, and opened the door, showing a domestic scene highly creditable to the much maligned British aristocracy—­Lord Mansford seated alone with his wife, in evidently amicable conversation.

After a few polite words he made Malling sit down beside her, and, saying he would have a cigarette in the foyer, he left them together.

Lady Mansford was a pretty, dark woman, of the slightly irresponsible and little-bird type.  She willingly turned her charmingly dressed head and chirped when noticed, and she was generally noticed because of her beauty.  Now she chirped of Ceylon, where Malling had been, and then, more vivaciously, of Parisian milliners, where she had been.  From these allied subjects Malling led her on to a slightly different topic—­religion.

“I went to St. Joseph’s last Sunday week,” he presently said.

“St. who—­what?” said Lady Mansford, who was busy with her opera-glasses, and had just noticed that Lady Sindon, a bird-like rival of hers, had changed the color of her hair, fortunately to her—­Lady Sindon’s—­disadvantage.

“To St. Joseph’s, to hear your brother-in-law preach.”

“It doesn’t do at all,” murmured Lady Mansford.  “It makes her look Chinese.”

“You said—?”

“Mollie Sindon.  But what were you talking about?  Do tell me.”  She laid down her glasses.

“I was saying that I went to church last Sunday week.”

“Why?”

“To hear your brother-in-law preach at St. Joseph’s.”

“Marcus!” exclaimed Lady Mansford.

She pursed her lips.

“I don’t go to St. Joseph’s.  Poor Sophy!  I’m sorry for her.”

“I lunched with Lady Sophia after the service.”

“Did you?  Isn’t it sad?”

“Sad!  I don’t quite understand?” said Malling, interrogatively.

“The change in him.  Of course people say it’s drink.  Such nonsense!  But they must say something, mustn’t they?”