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Updated: May 20, 2025
"I know enough of Wirsch and Griffinberg and the Beltons to be aware chat they wouldn't come down to the lakes at this time of the year unless there was something worth coming for, something and a pretty good sum to be made." Sir Stephen looked down at the floor for a moment, as if he were considering; then he leant forward.
"They say that the peerage will be announced to-night." Stafford nodded. And Griffenberg after a stare at Stafford's impassive face which evinced no flush of exultation, glanced at the others curiously, seemed about to add something, then checked himself and turned away, and as Stafford went on, said in a low voice to Wirsch: "Do you think he has heard? Looked rather glum, didn't he?"
"It's about the biggest thing on record, and is going to sweep the market. All the big 'uns are in it, Griffenberg and Wirsch and the Beltons. They say Sir Stephen has made half a million of money out of it already, and that he will make a couple of millions before he has done with it. There was a rumour in the city to-day that he was to get a peerage; for it's a kind of national affair, you see."
Never mind; this crowd will have gone presently, and then ah, then we'll have a jolly time to ourselves! Things are going well," he added, with a significant smile, as he glanced at Wirsch and Griffenberg, who, well-fed and comfortable, were in front of them. "I'm glad, sir," said Stafford. Sir Stephen smiled, but checked a sigh and a shrug of the shoulders.
Falconer seated himself in one of the lounges and looked at the players and round the handsome room in contemplative silence. Sir Stephen's eye wandered covertly towards him now and again, and once he said to Stafford: "See if Mr. Falconer has some whiskey, my boy?" As Stafford went up to Mr. Falconer's corner he saw that Mr. Griffinberg and Baron Wirsch had joined him.
"Plaistow is working the Colonial Office, the Beltons are feeling their way in the city; Wirsch but you know how the thing is done! I've got them down here that they may work it quietly, that I may have them under my eye " "And the lords and ladies they're to have a finger in the pie because, though they can't help you in the African business, they can in the matter of the peerage?"
We'll meet in the library, say at half past twelve, and get the thing finished, eh, baron?" Wirsch grunted approval. "Vare goot, Sare Stephen; dee sooner a ting ees congluded, de bedder. 'Arf bast dwelve!" There was but a short stay made in the drawing-room, and before ten o'clock the guests streamed into the magnificent ball-room.
Sir Stephen had been the life and soul and spring of the dinner; talking fashionable gossip to Lady Fitzharford on one side of him, and a "giddy girl of twenty" on the other; exchanging badinage with "Bertie," and telling deeply interesting stories to the men; and he was now dragging reluctant laughter from the grim Baron Wirsch and the almost grimmer Griffenberg, as he saw with one eye that the wine was circulating, and with the other that no one was being overlooked or allowed to drop into dullness.
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