The Princess Passes | Page 2

been made with an eye to my pleasure.
There was Jack Winston, who had lately married an American heiress,
not because she was an heiress, but because she was adorable; there
was the heiress herself, née Molly Randolph, whom I had known
through Winston's letters before I saw her lovely, laughing face; there
was Sir Horace Jerveyson, the richest grocer in the world, whom I
suspected Lady Blantock of actually regarding as a human being, and a
suitable successor to the late Sir James. Besides these, there was only
myself, Montagu Lane; and I believed that the dinner had been
arranged with a view to my claims as leading man in the love drama of
which Helen Blantock was leading lady, the other characters in the
scene merely being "on" as our "support." If this idea argued conceit, I
was punished.
It was with the entrée that the blow fell, and I had a curious, impersonal
sort of feeling that on every night to come, should I live for a hundred

years, each future entrée of each future dinner would recall the
sensation of this moment. Something inside me, that was myself yet not
myself, chuckled at the thought, and made a note to avoid entrées.
We had been asking each others' plans for August. Molly and Jack had
said that they were going to Switzerland to try the new Mercédès,
which had been given as a wedding present to the girl by a school
friend of that name, and of many dollars.
Then, solely to be civil, not because I wanted to know, I asked Sir
Horace Jerveyson what he meant to do. Hardly did I even expect to
hear his answer, for I was looking at Helen, and she was in great beauty.
But the man's words jumped to my ears.
"Miss Blantock and I are going to Scotland," answered the grocer, in
his fat voice, which might have been oiled with his own bacon. I stared
incredulously. "Together," he informatively added.
Lady Blantock laughed nervously. "I suppose we might as well let this
pass for an announcement?" she twittered. "Nell and Sir Horace have
been engaged a whole day. It will be in the Morning Post to-morrow.
Really, it has been so sudden that I feel quite dazed."
It was at this point that I drank to the girl's happiness, looking straight
into her eyes.
I have a dim impression that the grocer, who no doubt mistook her
blush for maiden pride of conquest, essayed to make a speech, and was
tactfully suppressed by the future mother-in-law. I am sure, though,
that it was Helen who presently asked, in pink-and-white confusion, if I,
too, were bound for Scotland. "But, of course you are," she added.
"No," I said. "I've been planning to take a walking tour as soon as this
tiresome season is over. I shall run across to France and wander for a
while. Eventually, I shall end up at Monte Carlo. A friend whom I
rather want to meet, will arrive there, at her villa, in October."
I knew that Jack Winston would understand, for he had not been the

only one last winter who had written letters. But Jack was of no
importance to me at the instant. I was talking at Helen, and she, too,
would understand. I hoped that, in understanding, she would suffer a
pang, a small, insignificant, poor relation of the pang inflicted upon me.
It is a thing unexplained by science why the miserable hours of our
lives should he fifty times the length of happy hours, though stupid
clocks, seeing nothing beyond their own hands, record both with the
same measurement. If we had sat at this prettily decorated dinner table
in the Carlton restaurant (I had thought it pretty at first, so I give it the
benefit of the doubt) through the night into the next day, while other
people ate breakfast and even luncheon, the moments could not have
dragged more heavily. But when it appeared that we must have reached
a ripe old age--those of us who had been young with the evening--Lady
Blantock thought we might have coffee in the "palm court." We had it,
and by rising at last, sweet Molly Winston saved me from doing the
musicians a mischief. "Lord Lane, you promised to let us drop you, in
the car," she said to me. "Oh, I don't mean to 'drop you' literally. Our
auto has no naughty ways. I hope we are not carrying you off too
soon."
[Illustration: "WE REALLY WANT YOU, SAID MOLLY".]
Too soon! I could have kissed her. "Angel," I murmured, when we
were out of the hotel, for in reality there had been no engagement.
"Thank you--and good-bye." I wrung her hand, and she gave a funny
little