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"You are coming out of your shell, Adela! Better late than never!" said Lady Wrackley to Lady Sellingworth, while Miss Van Tuyn quietly collected the two young men, both of whom she knew, with her violet eyes. "I hear of you all over the place." She glanced penetratingly at Craven with her carefully made-up eyes, which were the eyes of a handsome and wary bird.
"But what miracle?" he asked. "You have pulled Adela Sellingworth out of the shell in which she has been living curled up for over ten years." "Yes. You are a prodigy!" said Lady Wrackley, showing her teeth. "But I'm afraid I can't claim that triumph. I'm afraid it's due to Mr. Braybrooke's diplomacy." "Oh, no!" Mrs. Ackroyde said calmly. "Adela would never yield to his cotton-glove persuasions.
"You have that already." She looked at him satirically. "Do you know you're a terrible humbug?" she said. "And are not you?" "No; I think I show myself very much as I really am." "Can a woman do that?" he said, with sudden moodiness. "It depends. Mrs. Ackroyde can and Lady Wrackley can't." "And Lady Sellingworth?" he asked. "I'm afraid she is a bit of a humbug," said Miss Van Tuyn, without venom.
"We are just opposite to you then," she said. "Mind you behave prettily, Adela!" said Lady Wrackley. "I have almost forgotten how to behave in a theatre," she said. "I go to the play so seldom. You shall give me some hints on conduct, Mr. Craven." And she turned and led the way out of the restaurant, nodding to people here and there whom she knew.
And she followed Lady Wrackley and the young man with the turned-up nose to a big and shining motor which had just glided noiselessly up. "Damn the women!" muttered Craven, as he pushed through the crowd into the ugly freedom of Shaftesbury Avenue.
She was different. He had felt that for him there was quite a beautiful refuge in Berkeley Square. And now! What could have happened? She must surely be vexed about something he had done, or about something which had occurred on the previous evening. And he thought abut the evening carefully and minutely. Had she perhaps been upset by Lady Wrackley and Mrs. Ackroyde?
Francis Braybrooke began to talk to Lady Sellingworth, and almost immediately Lady Wrackley and Mrs. Birchington joined them. "How marvellous you look, Adela!" said Lady Wrackley, staring with her birdlike eyes. "You will cut us all out. I must go to Geneva. Have you heard about Beryl? But of course you have.
She did not want to see a nice and interesting boy make a fool of himself. Yet Craven was on the verge of doing that, if he had not already done it. Lady Wrackley and Mrs. Ackroyde had seen how things were, had taken in the whole situation in a moment. Miss Van Tuyn knew that, and in her knowledge there was bitterness.
Lady Wrackley, looking Craven thought like a remarkably fine pouter pigeon, came to the front of the box and stared about the house, while the young man with the turned-up nose gently, yet rather familiarly, withdrew from her a long coat of ermine. Meanwhile Mrs.
Craven shrank inwardly as he heard Miss Van Tuyn say "Adela," but he only nodded and tried to return adequately the expression in her eyes. Then he looked across the theatre, and saw Mrs. Ackroyde speaking to Lady Wrackley. After a moment they both gazed at him, and, seeing his eyes fixed on her, Lady Wrackley let go her smile at him and made a little gesture with her hand.
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