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Updated: July 6, 2025
He had seen her two or three times since his first introduction to her once at a ball to which Lady Grosville had taken her, and once on the terrace of the House of Commons, where he had strolled up and down with her for a most amusing and stimulating hour, while her mother entertained a group of elderly politicians.
So you believe evil things of Madame d'Estrées?" His tone was light, but his eyes sought the distant door, as though invoking some fellow-guest to appear and protect him. Lady Grosville did not answer. Ashe's look returned to her, and he was startled by the expression of her face.
Everybody was gathered; dinner had been announced; and the white-haired and gouty Lord Grosville was in a state of seething impatience that not even the mild-voiced Dean of the neighboring cathedral, engaged in complimenting him on his speech at the Diocesan Conference, could restrain. "Adelina, need we wait any longer?" said the master of the house, turning an angry eye upon his wife.
At Grosville Park the new fashion of "tea-gowns" was not favorably regarded. It was thought to be a mere device of silly and extravagant women, and an "afternoon dress," though of greater pretensions than a morning gown, was still a sober affair, not in any way to be confounded with those decorative effects that nature and sound sense reserved for the evening.
"All the fault of the Grosvilles," said Ashe, after a moment, lighting another cigarette, "in shutting up their great heavy house, and drawing their great heavy curtains on a May night, when all reasonable people want to be out-of-doors. My dear mother, what's the good of paying any attention to what people like Lady Grosville say of people like Kitty?
"You remember the tales of old Lord Blackwater?" "But is there really any truth in it? Or is it mere gossip?" "Well, I hear that the behavior of both of them at Grosville Park last week was such that Lady Grosville vows she will never ask either of them again.
And meanwhile what new and dolorous truths had Lady Kitty been learning as to her mother's history and her mother's position? By Jove! it was hard upon the girl. Darrell was right. Why not leave her to her French friends and relations? or relinquish her to Lady Grosville? Madame d'Estrées had seen little or nothing of her for years.
Nor had the lips of any English girl ever dealt there with a poetic diction so unchastened and unashamed. Lady Grosville might well feel as though the solid frame of things were melting and cracking round her. Kitty ceased. She fell back upon her chair, smitten with a sudden perception. "You made me!" she said, reproachfully, to the Dean. The Dean said another "Brava!" and gave another clap.
Ashe observed the furtive study that the Grosville girls could not help bestowing upon her upon her shoulder-straps and long, bare arms, upon her high waist and the blue and silver bands in her hair. Kitty herself sat in a pensive or proud silence.
At luncheon the Sunday luncheon which still, at Grosville Park, as in the early Victorian days of Lord Grosville's mother, consisted of a huge baronial sirloin to which all else upon the varied table appeared as appurtenance and appendage, Ashe allowed himself the inward reflection that the Grosville Park Sundays were degenerating.
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