She asked the name of the lady whose box I had quitted, and after bending her opera-glass on it for a moment, said, with a certain air of satisfaction, ‘She is young’; which led me to guess that Lady Edbury was reputed to be Anna’s successor; but why the latter should be flattered by the former’s youth was one of the mysteries for me then.  Her aunt was awakened from sleep by the mention of my name.  ‘Is the man here?’ she exclaimed, starting.  Anna smiled, and talked to me of my father, saying, that she was glad to see me at his right hand, for he had a hard battle to fight.  She spoke of him with affectionate interest in his fortunes; no better proof of his generosity as well as hers could have been given me.  I promised her heartily I would not be guilty of letting our intimacy drop, and handed the ladies down to the crush-room, where I saw my father leading Lady Edbury to her carriage, much observed.  Destrier, the young marquis, coming in to meet the procession from other haunts, linked his arm to his friend Witlington’s, and said something in my hearing of old ‘Duke Fitz,’ which provoked, I fancied, signs of amusement equivalent to tittering in a small ring of the select assembly.  Lady Sampleman’s carriage was called.  ‘Another victim,’ said a voice.  Anna Penrhys walked straight out to find her footman and carriage for herself.

I stood alone in the street, wondering, fretting, filled with a variety of ugly sensations, when my father joined me humming an air of the opera.  ’I was looking for Jorian, Richie.  He had our Sampleman under his charge.  He is off to the Chassediane.  Well!  And well, Richie, you could not bear the absence from your dada?  You find me in full sail on the tide.  I am at home, if our fortunes demand it, in a little German principality, but there is,’ he threw out his chest, ’a breadth in London; nowhere else do I breathe with absolute freedom—­so largely:  and this is my battlefield.  By the way, Lady Edbury accounts you complete; which is no more to say than that she is a woman of taste.  The instance:  she positively would not notice that you wear a dress-coat of a foreign cut.  Correct it to-morrow; my tailor shall wait on you.  I meant to point out to you that when a London woman has not taken note of that, the face and the man have made the right impression on her.  Richie, dear boy, how shall I speak the delight I have in seeing you!  My arm in yours, old Richie! strolling home from the Fashion:  this seems to me what I dreamt of!  All in sound health at the Grange?  She too, the best of women?’

‘I have come on very particular business,’ I interposed briefly.

He replied, ‘I am alive to you, Richie; speak.’

‘The squire has seen my bankers’ book.  He thinks I’ve been drawing rather wildly:  no doubt he’s right.  He wants some sort of explanation.  He consents to an interview with you.  I have come to ask you to go down to him, sir.’