“Not because I have forgotten your kind invitation,” Arnold replied, taking the chair by Fenella’s side which the butler was holding for him.  “Unfortunately, I am at work nearly every afternoon.”

“Mr. Chetwode is my husband’s secretary now, you must remember,” Fenella remarked, “and during his absence he naturally finds a great deal to do.”

“Well, I am sure I am only too glad,” Lady Blennington said, “to hear of a young man who does any work at all, nowadays.  They mostly seem to do nothing but hang about looking for a job.  When you told me,” she continued, “that you were really in the city, I wasn’t at all sure that you were in earnest.”

Sabatini sighed.

“I can assure you, Lady Blennington,” he declared, “that so far as my sex is represented here to-day, we are very strenuous people indeed.  Signor di Marito here carries upon his shoulders a burden, just at the present moment, which few of the ambassadors would care to have to deal with.  Mr. Chetwode I have visited in his office, and I can assure you that so far as his industry is concerned there is no manner of doubt.  As for myself—­”

Lady Blennington interrupted gayly.

“Come,” she said, “I believe it of these two others, if you insist, but you are not going to ask us to believe that you, the personification of idleness, are also among the toilers!”

Sabatini looked at her reproachfully.

“One is always misunderstood,” he murmured.  “This morning, as a matter of fact, I have been occupied since daybreak.”

“Let us hear all about it,” Lady Blennington demanded.

“My energies have been directed into two channels,” Sabatini announced.  “I have been making preparations for a possible journey, and I have been trying to find a missing man.”

Arnold looked up quickly.  Fenella paused with her glass raised to her lips.

“Who is the missing man?” Lady Blennington asked.

“Mr. Weatherley,” Sabatini replied.  “We can scarcely call him that, perhaps, but he has certainly gone off on a little expedition without leaving his address.”

“Well, you amaze me!” Lady Blennington exclaimed.  “I never thought that he was that sort of a husband.”

“Did you make any discoveries?” asked Arnold.

Sabatini shook his head.

“None,” he confessed.  “As an investigator I was a failure.  However, I must say that I prosecuted my inquiries in one direction only.  It may interest you to know that I have come to the conclusion that Mr. Weatherley’s disappearance is not connected in any way with the matters of which we spoke this morning.”

“Then it remains the more mysterious,” declared Arnold.

“Fenella, at any rate, is not disposed to wear widow’s weeds,” remarked Lady Blennington.  “Cheer up, dear, he’ll come back all right.  Husbands always do.  It is our other intimate friends who desert us.”

Fenella laughed.