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Yet, when it came to making definite terms he seemed to take it for granted that, as the Annesley-Setons would be living in the house as guests, they would not only be willing, but anxious, to accept a low price. This had not been their intention. On the contrary, they had meant their visit and social offices to be a great, extra favour, which ought to raise rather than lower the rent.
There was great excitement for the next few days at Valley House and throughout the neighbourhood, for the Annesley-Setons made no secret of the robbery, and the affair got into the papers, not only the local ones, but the London dailies. Two of the latter sent representatives, to whom Lord Annesley-Seton granted interviews. Something he said attracted the reporters' attention to Mr. and Mrs.
What the Portman Square experiences of the bride would have been if Knight had allowed the Annesley-Setons to begin by ruling it would be dangerous to say. But he had taken his stand; and without guessing that she owed her freedom of action to her husband's strength of will, she revelled in it with a joy so intense that it came close to pain.
"But why should you take so much trouble and how can you tell that the editor's paragraph would make the Annesley-Setons want to know us?" "As for the paragraph, you may put your faith in me. And as for the trouble, nothing's too much to launch my wife on the top wave of society, where she has every right to be. I want Mrs. Nelson Smith to have her chance to shine.
"I think you'll love it," she told him. "We might stay at several places I used to adore when I was a child. And if we get to Sidmouth, maybe you'll have a glimpse of those cousins you were talking about, the Annesley-Setons. I believe they have a place near by called Valley House; but I don't know whether they live there or let it." "We'll go to Sidmouth," he said. The girl smiled.
"Rather theatrical, don't you think?" said the Duchess of Peebles. "It's more satisfactory to go to a woman you can pay with money and not invitations." So Madalena was not mourned for long; and the Annesley-Setons were fortunate enough to replace their lost American millionaire with one from Australia. He was old, and his wife was fat; but you can't have everything.
And that thought brought him back to the question which over and over he asked in his mind. Who could have written the anonymous letter? It must be someone acquainted with him, or with his profession; someone who knew the Nelson Smiths and the Annesley-Setons well enough to be aware that there was to be an Easter party at Valley House.
The Annesley-Setons had skimmed the topmost layer of the cream for our benefit, and the Countess would have been 'out' of it in such a set, unless she'd been telling fortunes. You can ask her when you've a crowd of women. She'll amuse them, and gather glory for herself. But I'm not going to have her encouraged to think we belong to her. We've set the woman on her feet by what we've done.
The Annesley-Setons' first move on the social chessboard was to make use of a pawn or two in the shape of "society reporters." They knew a few men and women of good birth and no money who lived by writing anonymously for the newspapers. These people were delighted to get material for a paragraph, or photographs for their editors.
Her sense of honour was more valuable to him than her sense of humour. He was afraid to put the former on the defensive, and he was glad to let her believe the Annesley-Setons were genuinely "warming" to them in a way which proved that blood was thicker than water.
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