She was lying on a couch in her white and gilt drawing room one afternoon-alas! the craze for French furniture was o'er-smelling-bottle in hand and a bona fide ache in her head, when the door opened and Tracy walked into the room.
"Good heavens!" she said faintly, and uncorked her salts.
It was his Grace's first appearance since she had come to Bath, and the fact that he had politely declined an invitation that she had sent to him still rankled in her mind. He bowed over the limp hand that she extended, and looked her up and down.
"I regret to find you thus indisposed, my dear sister," he said smoothly.
"'Tis nought. Only one of my stupid headaches. I am never well here, and this house is stuffy," she answered fretfully.
"You should take the waters," he said, scrutinising, through his eyeglass, the chair to which she had waved him. "It has an unstable appearance, my dear; I believe I prefer the couch." He moved to a smaller sofa and sat down.
"Pray, how long have you been in Bath?" she demanded.
"I arrived last Tuesday week."
Lady Lavinia started up.
"Last Tuesday week? Then you have been here ten days and not visited me until now!"
He appeared to be examining the whiteness of his hands through the folds of black lace that drooped over them.
"I believe I had other things to do," he said coolly.
A book of sermons that she had been trying to peruse slid to the ground as Lavinia jerked a cushion into place.
"And you come to me when it suits you? How could you be so unkind as to refuse my invitation?"
There was a rising, querulous note in her voice which gave warning of anger.
"My dear Lavinia, if you exhibit your deplorable temper to me, I shall leave you, so have a care. I thought you would understand that your good husband's society, improving though it may be, would be altogether too oppressive for my taste. In fact, I was surprised at your letter."
"You might have come for my sake," she answered peevishly, sinking back again. "I suppose you have been dancing attendance on the Molesly woman? Lud! but I think you men have gone crazed."
Understanding came to his Grace, and he smiled provokingly.
"Is that what upsets you? I wondered."
"No, 'tis not!" she flashed. "And I do not see why you should think so! For my part, I cannot see that she is even tolerable, and the way the men rave about her is disgusting! . Disgusting! But 'tis always the same when a woman is unattached and wealthy. Well! Well! Why do you not say something; Do you find her so lovely?"