Until he was quite close to her, Loder did not seem to see her.  Then he stopped quietly.

“I was speaking to Lakely,” he said.  “He wants me to dine with him one night at Cadogan Gardens.”

But Eve was silent, waiting for him to address Blessington.  She glanced at him quickly, but though their eyes met he did not catch the meaning that lay in hers.  It was a difficult moment.  She had known him incredibly, almost unpardonably, absent-minded, but it had invariably been when he was suffering from nerves,” as she phrased it to herself.  But to-night he was obviously in the possession of unclouded faculties.  She colored slightly and glanced under her lashes at Blessington.  Had the same idea struck him, she wondered?  But he was studiously studying a suit of Chinese armor that stood close by in a niche of the wall.

“Bobby has been keeping me amused while you talked to Mr. Lakely,” she said, pointedly.

Directly addressed, Loder turned and looked at Blessington.  “How d’you do?” he said, with doubtful cordiality.  The name of Bobby conveyed nothing to him.

To his surprise, Eve looked annoyed, and Blessington’s fresh-colored face deepened in tone.  With a slow, uncomfortable sensation he was aware of having struck a wrong note.

There was a short, unpleasant pause.  Then, more by intuition than actual sight, Blessington saw Eve’s eyes turn from him to Loder, and with quick tact he saved the situation.

“How d’you do, sir?” he responded, with a smile.  “I congratulate you on looking so—­so uncommon well.  I was just telling Mrs. Chilcote that I hold a commission for Lady Astrupp to-night.  I’m a sort of scout at present—­reporting on the outposts.”  He spoke fast and without much meaning, but his boyish voice eased the strain.

Eve thanked him with a smile.  “Then we mustn’t interfere with a person on active service,” she said.  “Besides, we have our own duties to get through.”

She smiled again, and, touching Loder’s arm, indicated the reception-rooms.

When they entered the larger of the two rooms Lady Bramfell was still receiving her guests.  She was a tall and angular woman, who, except for a certain beauty of hands and feet and a certain similarity of voice, possessed nothing in common with her sister Lillian.  She was speaking to a group of people as they approached, and the first sound of her sweet and rather drawling tones touched Loder with a curious momentary feeling—­a vague suggestion of awakened memories.  Then the suggestion vanished as she turned and greeted Eve.

“How sweet of you to come!” she murmured.  And it seemed to Loder that a more spontaneous smile lighted up her face.  Then she extended her hand to him.  “And you, too!” she added.  “Though I fear we shall bore you dreadfully.”

Watching her with interest, he saw the change of expression as her eyes turned from Eve to him, and noticed a colder tone in her voice as she addressed him directly.  The observation moved him to self-assertion.