I am just going to walk
across into Piccadilly, and my wife is left alone with them. I am
afraid they are rather spoilt children; but I have half promised
them you shall come.'
The steps were let down, and Elfride was transferred--to the
intense delight of the little girls, and to the mild interest of
loungers with red skins and long necks, who cursorily eyed the
performance with their walking-sticks to their lips, occasionally
laughing from far down their throats and with their eyes, their
mouths not being concerned in the operation at all. Lord
Luxellian then told the coachman to drive on, lifted his hat,
smiled a smile that missed its mark and alighted on a total
stranger, who bowed in bewilderment. Lord Luxellian looked long
at Elfride.
The look was a manly, open, and genuine look of admiration; a
momentary tribute of a kind which any honest Englishman might have
paid to fairness without being ashamed of the feeling, or
permitting it to encroach in the slightest degree upon his
emotional obligations as a husband and head of a family. Then
Lord Luxellian turned away, and walked musingly to the upper end
of the promenade.
Mr. Swancourt had alighted at the same time with Elfride, crossing
over to the Row for a few minutes to speak to a friend he
recognized there; and his wife was thus left sole tenant of the
carriage.
Now, whilst this little act had been in course of performance,
there stood among the promenading spectators a man of somewhat
different description from the rest.
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