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Updated: June 13, 2025
Overwhelmed, Annesley walked beside him in silence to the almost deserted restaurant where the latest breakfasters had finished and the earliest lunchers had not begun. So the mysterious Mr. Smith was rich. The news frightened rather than pleased her. It seemed to throw a burden upon her shoulders which she might not be able to carry with grace.
What Annesley saw was a copy of the Morning Post. Knight's mention of the Countess de Santiago's power of clairvoyance at the same time with the liner Monarchic printed before her eyes a paragraph which her subconscious self had never forgotten. For the moment only her body sat between a young hunting baronet and a distinguished elderly general at her cousins' dinner table.
"This is a pleasure and a surprise," began the Countess, smiling, her eyes appearing to take in the full-length portrait of Annesley Grayle with their wide, unmoving gaze. When she smiled she was still extremely handsome, but not so perfect as with lips closed, for her white teeth were too short, somewhat irregular, and set too wide apart.
"Nelson Smith" followed, smiling at Annesley over the elder man's high, narrow head sparsely covered with lank hair of fading brown. It was at this moment Mrs. Ellsworth chose to appear, habited once more in a hurriedly donned dressing gown, a white silk scarf substituted in haste for a discarded nightcap.
There was nothing in his dress though some mysterious arrangement in his costume, some rare simplicity, some curious happiness, always made it distinguished there was nothing, however, in his dress, which could account for the influence which he exercised over the manners of his contemporaries. Charles Annesley was about thirty.
He was immensely rich, she was "highly connected" as well as beautiful, having been a Miss Annesley Grayle, related on her mother's side to the Earl of Annesley-Seton.
Annesley flung up her arms in a gesture of abandonment. "Let it go at that," she sighed, "until I can think of something better." "Very well. We won't argue that part yet. The thing to make sure of at the moment is this: Do I get a cable, say on the day everyone's leaving Valley House, calling me back to America on urgent business, and do I take you with me?"
Then there was a knock at the door, and his mother entered, "Tell me, Harry, what she says." He rushed up to his mother, all damp and half-shod as he was, and seized her in his arms. "Oh, mother, mother!" "What is it, dear?" "Read that, and tell me whether there ever was a finer human being!" Mrs. Annesley did read it, and thought that her own daughter Molly was just as fine a creature.
"Drink some champagne," said Smith's quiet voice. The girl obeyed, and the ice-cold wine cooled the fire in blood and nerves. "You have been splendid," Smith encouraged her. "I know you won't fail me now." "I promise you I will not!" returned Annesley. "The worst is over. I feel ready for anything." "How can I thank you?" he murmured.
And then, out of a plunge into thought, "You say you've never seen the Mr. Smith you came to meet at the Savoy? How can you be sure it isn't old 'R. S. as they call him at Van Vreck's, wanting to play you a trick give you a surprise?" Annesley shook her head. "If you knew Mr. Ruthven Smith, you'd know that would be impossible. Why, I don't believe he remembers when I'm out of sight that I exist."
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