“You have something to say to me, Sir Patrick, on the subject of my second son.  I am in great affliction.  If you bring me bad news, I will do my best to bear it.  May I trust to your kindness not to keep me in suspense?”

“It will help me to make my intrusion as little painful as possible to your ladyship,” replied Sir Patrick, “if I am permitted to ask a question.  Have you heard of any obstacle to the contemplated marriage of Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn and Mrs. Glenarm?”

Even that distant reference to Anne produced an ominous change for the worse in Lady Holchester’s manner.

“I have heard of the obstacle to which you allude,” she said.  “Mrs. Glenarm is an intimate friend of mine.  She has informed me that a person named Silvester, an impudent adventuress—­”

“I beg your ladyship’s pardon.  You are doing a cruel wrong to the noblest woman I have ever met with.”

“I can not undertake, Sir Patrick, to enter into your reasons for admiring her.  Her conduct toward my son has, I repeat, been the conduct of an impudent adventuress.”

Those words showed Sir Patrick the utter hopelessness of shaking her prejudice against Anne.  He decided on proceeding at once to the disclosure of the truth.

“I entreat you so say no more,” he answered.  “Your ladyship is speaking of your son’s wife.”

“My son has married Miss Silvester?”

“Yes.”

She turned deadly pale.  It appeared, for an instant, as if the shock had completely overwhelmed her.  But the mother’s weakness was only momentary The virtuous indignation of the great lady had taken its place before Sir Patrick could speak again.  She rose to terminate the interview.

“I presume,” she said, “that your errand here is as an end.”

Sir Patrick rose, on his side, resolute to do the duty which had brought him to the house.

“I am compelled to trespass on your ladyship’s attention for a few minutes more,” he answered.  “The circumstances attending the marriage of Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn are of no common importance.  I beg permission (in the interests of his family) to state, very briefly, what they are.”

In a few clear sentences he narrated what had happened, that afternoon, in Portland Place.  Lady Holchester listened with the steadiest and coldest attention.  So far as outward appearances were concerned, no impression was produced upon her.

“Do you expect me,” she asked, “to espouse the interests of a person who has prevented my son from marrying the lady of his choice, and of mine?”

“Mr. Geoffrey Delamayn, unhappily, has that reason for resenting his wife’s innocent interference with interests of considerable, importance to him,” returned Sir Patrick.  “I request your ladyship to consider whether it is desirable—­in view of your son’s conduct in the future—­to allow his wife to stand in the doubly perilous relation toward him of being also a cause of estrangement between his father and himself.”