He moved on a few steps and bowed over the thin, over-bejewelled fingers of the Countess of Clanarton, an old lady whose vogue still remained unchallenged, although the publication of her memoirs had very nearly sent a highly respected publisher into prison.

“Andrew,” she exclaimed, “we are all so distressed about you!  How dared you lose your election!  You know my little fire-eating friend, I see.  I keep in with her because when the revolution comes she is going to save me from the guillotine, aren’t you, Nora?”

“My revolution won’t have anything to do with guillotines,” the girl laughed back, “and if you really want to have a powerful friend at court, pin your faith on Mr. Tallente.”

Lady Clanarton shook her head.

“I have known Andrew, my dear, since he was in his cradle,” she said.  “I have heard him spout Socialism, and I know he has written about revolutions, but, believe me, he’s a good old-fashioned Whig at heart.  He’ll never carry the red flag.  I see your wife has bought the Maharajaim of Sapong’s pearls, Andrew.  Do you think she’d leave them to me if I were to call on her?”

“Why not ask her?” Tallente suggested.  “She is over there.”

“Dear me, so she is!” she exclaimed.  “How smart, too!  I thought when she came in she must be some one not quite respectable, she was so well-dressed.  Going, Andrew?  Well, come and see me before you return to the country.  And I wouldn’t go and have tea with that little hussy, if I were you.  She’ll burn the good old-fashioned principles out of you, if anything could.”

“Not later than five, please,” Nora called out.  “You shall have muffins, if I can get them.”

“She’s got her eye on you,” the old lady chuckled.  “Most dangerous child in London, they all tell me.  You’re warned, Andrew.”

He smiled as he raised her fingers to his lips.

“Is my danger political or otherwise?” he whispered.

“Otherwise, I should think,” was the prompt retort.  “You are too British to change our politics, but thank goodness infidelity is one of the cosmopolitan virtues.  You were never the man to marry a plaster-cast type of wife, Andrew, for all her millions.  I could have done better for you than that.  What’s this they are telling me about Tony Palliser?”

Tallente stiffened a little.

“A good many people seem to be talking about Tony Palliser,” he observed.

“You shouldn’t have let your wife make such an idiot of herself with him—­lunching and dining and theatring all the time.  And now they say he has disappeared.  Poor little man!  What have you done to him, Andrew?”

Tallente sighed.

“I can see that I shall have to take you into my confidence,” he murmured.

“You needn’t tell me a single word, because I shouldn’t believe you if you did.  Are you staying here with your wife?”

“No,” Tallente answered.  “I am back at my old rooms in Charges Street.”