who had driven to the door, and perhaps been admitted
to some wretched gathering of wretched people,—and
not, after all, to have met the Emperor and the Prince.
But then, should she hear on the next morning that
the Emperor and the Princes, that the Princesses,
and the Duchesses, with the Ambassadors, Cabinet Ministers,
and proper sort of world generally, had all been there,—that
the world, in short, had ignored Melmotte’s villainy,—
then would her grief be still greater. She sat
down to dinner with her husband and Miss Longestaffe,
and could not talk freely on the matter. Miss
Longestaffe was still a guest of the Melmottes, although
she had transferred herself to the Monograms for a
day or two. And a horrible idea crossed Lady
Monogram’s mind. What should she...