About the middle of March Lady Baldock came up from Baddingham to London, coerced into doing so, as Violet Effingham declared, in thorough opposition to all her own tastes, by the known wishes of her friends and relatives.  Her friends and relatives, so Miss Effingham insinuated, were unanimous in wishing that Lady Baldock should remain at Baddingham Park, and therefore,—­that wish having been indiscreetly expressed,—­she had put herself to great inconvenience, and had come to London in March.  “Gustavus will go mad,” said Violet to Lady Laura.  The Gustavus in question was the Lord Baldock of the present generation, Miss Effingham’s Lady Baldock being the peer’s mother.  “Why does not Lord Baldock take a house himself?” asked Lady Laura.  “Don’t you know, my dear,” Violet answered, “how much we Baddingham people think of money?  We don’t like being vexed and driven mad, but even that is better than keeping up two households.”  As regarded Violet, the injury arising from Lady Baldock’s early migration was very great, for she was thus compelled to move from Grosvenor Place to Lady Baldock’s house in Berkeley Square.  “As you are so fond of being in London, Augusta and I have made up our minds to come up before Easter,” Lady Baldock had written to her.

“I shall go to her now,” Violet had said to her friend, “because I have not quite made up my mind as to what I will do for the future.”

“Marry Oswald, and be your own mistress.”

“I mean to be my own mistress without marrying Oswald, though I don’t see my way quite clearly as yet.  I think I shall set up a little house of my own, and let the world say what it pleases.  I suppose they couldn’t make me out to be a lunatic.”

“I shouldn’t wonder if they were to try,” said Lady Laura.

“They could not prevent me in any other way.  But I am in the dark as yet, and so I shall be obedient and go to my aunt.”

Miss Effingham went to Berkeley Square, and Phineas Finn was introduced to Lady Baldock.  He had been often in Grosvenor Place, and had seen Violet frequently.  Mr. Kennedy gave periodical dinners,—­once a week,—­to which everybody went who could get an invitation; and Phineas had been a guest more than once.  Indeed, in spite of his miseries he had taken to dining out a good deal, and was popular as an eater of dinners.  He could talk when wanted, and did not talk too much, was pleasant in manners and appearance, and had already achieved a certain recognised position in London life.  Of those who knew him intimately, not one in twenty were aware from whence he came, what was his parentage, or what his means of living.  He was a member of Parliament, a friend of Mr. Kennedy’s, was intimate with Mr. Monk, though an Irishman did not as a rule herd with other Irishmen, and was the right sort of person to have at your house.  Some people said he was a cousin of Lord Brentford’s, and others declared that he was Lord Chiltern’s earliest friend.  There he was, however, with a position gained, and even Lady Baldock asked him to her house.