They went downstairs then.  Trefusis sat between Agatha and Lady Brandon, to whom he addressed all his conversation.  They chatted without much interruption from the business of the table; for Jane, despite her amplitude, had a small appetite, and was fearful of growing fat; whilst Trefusis was systematically abstemious.  Sir Charles was unusually silent.  He was afraid to talk about art, lest he should be contradicted by Trefusis, who, he already felt, cared less and perhaps knew more about it than he.  Having previously commented to Agatha on the beauty of the ripening spring, and inquired whether her journey had fatigued her, he had said as much as he could think of at a first meeting.  For her part, she was intent on Trefusis, who, though he must know, she thought, that they were all hostile to him except Jane, seemed as confident now as when he had befooled her long ago.  That thought set her teeth on edge.  She did not doubt the sincerity of her antipathy to him even when she detected herself in the act of protesting inwardly that she was not glad to meet him again, and that she would not speak to him.  Gertrude, meanwhile, was giving short answers to Erskine and listening to Trefusis.  She had gathered from the domestic squabbles of the last few days that Lady Brandon, against her husband’s will, had invited a notorious demagogue, the rich son of a successful cotton-spinner, to visit the Beeches.  She had made up her mind to snub any such man.  But on recognizing the long-forgotten Smilash, she had been astonished, and had not known what to do.  So, to avoid doing anything improper, she had stood stilly silent and done nothing, as the custom of English ladies in such cases is.  Subsequently, his unconscious self-assertion had wrought with her as with the others, and her intention of snubbing him had faded into the limbo of projects abandoned without trial.  Erskine alone was free from the influence of the intruder.  He wished himself elsewhere; but beside Gertrude the presence or absence of any other person troubled him very little.

“How are the Janseniuses?” said Trefusis, suddenly turning to Agatha.

“They are quite well, thank you,” she said in measured tones.

“I met John Jansenius in the city lately.  You know Jansenius?” he added parenthetically to Sir Charles.  “Cotman’s bank—­the last Cotman died out of the firm before we were born.  The Chairman of the Transcanadian Railway Company.”

“I know the name.  I am seldom in the city.”

“Naturally,” assented Trefusis; “for who would sadden himself by pushing his way through a crowd of such slaves, if he could help it?  I mean slaves of Mammon, of course.  To run the gauntlet of their faces in Cornhill is enough to discourage a thoughtful man for hours.  Well, Jansenius, being high in the court of Mammon, is looking out for a good post in the household for his son.  Jansenius, by-the-bye is Miss Wylie’s guardian and the father of my late wife.”