The next time that I met Mrs. Gregory St. Michael it was on my way to join the party at the old church, which Mrs. Weguelin was going to show them. The card-case was in her hand, and the sight of it prompted me to allude to Hortense Rieppe.
“I find her beauty growing upon me?” I declared.
Mrs. Gregory did not deny the beauty, although she spoke with reserve at first. “It is to be said that she knows how to write a suitable note,” the lady also admitted.
She didn’t tell me what the note was about, naturally; but I could imagine with what joy in the exercise of her art Hortense had constructed that communication which must have accompanied the prompt return of the card-case.
Then Mrs. Gregory’s tongue became downright. “Since you’re able to see so much of her, why don’t you tell her to marry that little steam-yacht gambler? I’m sure he’s dying to, and he’s just the thing for her?”
“Ah,” I returned, “Love so seldom knows what’s just the thing for marriage.”
“Then your precocity theory falls,” declared Mrs. St. Michael. And as she went away from me along the street, I watched her beautiful stately walk; for who could help watching a sight so good?
Charley, then, was no secret to John’s people. Was John still a secret to Charley? Could Hortense possibly have managed this? I hoped for a chance to observe the two men with her during the visit of Mrs. Weguelin St. Michael and her party to the church.
This party was already assembled when I arrived upon the spot appointed. In the street, a few paces from the church, stood Bohm and Charley and Kitty and Gazza, with Beverly Rodgers, who, as I came near, left them and joined me.
“Oh, she’s somewhere off with her fire-eater,” responded Beverly to my immediate inquiry for Hortense. “Do you think she was asked, old man?”
Probably not, I thought. “But she goes so well with the rest,” I suggested.
Beverly gave his chuckle. “She goes where she likes. She’ll meet us here when we’re finished, I’m pretty sure.”
“Well, she has to attend to Charley, you know!”
Mrs. Weguelin, it appeared, had met the party here by the church, but had now gone somewhere in the immediate neighborhood to find out why the gate was not opened to admit us, and to hasten the unpunctual custodian of the keys. I had not looked for precisely such a party as Mrs. Weguelin’s invitation had gathered, nor could I imagine that she had fully understood herself what she was gathering; and this I intimated to Beverly Rodgers, saying:--