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"Oh, do find out what this is all about; who won that? what was it? Ah, Captain Braybrooke, please come here and explain all this to me. Why are they cheering?" "That was the two hundred yard race over hurdles, Miss Chipchase. They are cheering the winner, Mr. Montague, our opponent, you know.
She might not care to see very much of him although he knew that she liked him. They had touched the fringe of intimacy on the preceding night. After his work at the Foreign Office was over he walked to the club, and the first man he saw on entering it was Francis Braybrooke just back from Paris. Braybrooke was buying some stamps in the hall, and greeted Craven with his usual discreet cordiality.
Craven, perhaps, was bringing a little solace into this lonely life. And now he, Braybrooke, was endeavouring to make an end of that solace. For he quite understood that, women being as they are, a strong friendship between Adela Sellingworth and Craven was quite incompatible with a love affair between Craven and Beryl Van Tuyn.
"You talked of my changing my sofa for a sofa somewhere else! If Beryl is not going to marry why should I think of changing?" "But nothing lasts for ever. The whole world is in a state of flux." "Really, Mr. Braybrooke! I am quite sure I am not in a state of flux!" said Miss Cronin with unusual dignity. "We American women, you must understand, have our principles and know how to preserve them."
As an account by an eye-witness of the manners of the Court and of society it is invaluable, but it is still more interesting as, perhaps, the most singular example extant of unreserved self-revelation all the foibles, peccadilloes, and more serious offences against decorum of the author being set forth with the most relentless naïveté and minuteness, it was written in a cypher or shorthand, which was translated into long-hand by John Smith in 1825, and ed. by Lord Braybrooke, with considerable excisions.
She had persuaded Braybrooke to invite Lady Sellingworth to make a fourth in order that she might find out whether any link had been forged between Craven and Lady Sellingworth, whether there was really any secret understanding between them, or whether that tete-a-tete dinner in Soho had been merely a passing pleasure, managed by Lady Sellingworth, meaning little, and likely to lead to nothing.
He went to Claridge's in inquire for Miss Van Tuyn. On ascertaining that she was not at home he sent up his name to Miss Cronin, who was practically always in the house. At any rate, Braybrooke, who had met her several times at Miss Van Tuyn's apartment in Paris, had understood so from herself.
And yet some young girls are devoted to her." "Perhaps that is because she has abdicated." Braybrooke looked at Craven with rather sharp inquiry. "I only mean that I don't think, as a rule, young girls are very fond of elderly women whose motto is 'never give up." Craven explained. "Ah?" Braybrooke was silent.
"I have been very happy in Paris." "And yet you have deserted it for years and years! You are an enigma. Isn't she, Mr. Braybrooke?" Before Braybrooke had time to reply to this direct question an interruption occurred. Two ladies, coming in to dinner accompanied by two young men, paused by Braybrooke's table, and someone said in a clear, hard voice: "What a dinky little party!
Lady Sellingworth hated the thought of that marriage and the idea that Braybrooke was probably intent on trying to bring it about, or at any rate was considering whether he should make the endeavour, roused in her resentment against him. "Tiresome old man!" she said to herself, as she stood by the fire. "Why won't he let things alone? What business is it of his?"
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