[They separate; he stands looking out upon the leads. MISS CLARIDGE enters, preceding the MARQUESS OF QUEX and SIR CHICHESTER FRAYNE.  LORD QUEX is forty-eight, keen-faced and bright-eyed, faultless in dress, in manner debonair and charming. FRAYNE is a genial wreck of about five-and-forty—­the lean and shrivelled remnant of a once good-looking man.  His face is yellow and puckered, his hair prematurely silvered, his moustache palpably touched-up.

QUEX.

[Perceiving SOPHY and approaching her.] How are you, Miss Fullgarney?

SOPHY.

[Respectfully, but icily.] Oh, how do you do, my lord?

[MISS CLARIDGE withdraws. FRAYNE comes forward, eyeing SOPHY with interest.

QUEX.

My aunt—­Lady Owbridge—­has asked me to meet her here at two o’clock.  Her ladyship is lunching at a tea-shop close by—­bunning is a more fitting expression—­with Mrs. Eden and Miss Eden.

SOPHY.

[Gladly.] Miss Muriel!

QUEX.

Yes, I believe Miss Muriel will place her pretty finger-tips in your charge, [partly to FRAYNE] while I escort Lady Owbridge and Mrs. Jack to view this new biblical picture—­[with a gesture] a few doors up.  What is the subject?—­Moses in the Bulrushes. [To FRAYNE.] Come with us, Chick.

SOPHY.

It’s not quite two, my lord; if you like, you’ve just time to run in next door and have your palm read.

QUEX.

My palm—?

SOPHY.

By this extraordinary palmist everybody is talking about—­Valma.

QUEX.

[Pleasantly.] One of these fortune-telling fellows, eh? [Shaking his head.] I prefer the gipsy on Epsom race-course.

SOPHY.

[Under her breath.] Oh, indeed! [Curtly.] Please take a seat.

[She flounces up to the desk and busies herself there vindictively.

FRAYNE.

[To QUEX.] Who’s that gal? what’s her name?

QUEX.

Fullgarney; a protegee of the Edens.  Her father was bailiff to old Mr.
Eden, at their place in Norfolk.

FRAYNE.

Rather alluring—­eh, what?

QUEX.

[Wincing.] Don’t, Chick!

FRAYNE.

My dear Harry, it is perfectly proper, now that you are affianced to Miss Eden, and have reformed all that sort of thing—­it is perfectly proper that you should no longer observe pretty women too narrowly.

QUEX.

Obviously.

FRAYNE.

But do bear in mind that your old friend is not so pledged.  Recollect that I have been stuck for the last eight years, with intervals of leave, on the West Coast of Africa, nursing malaria—­

QUEX

[Severely.] Only malaria?