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‘That seems to dispose of me,’ said Hugh, with a disarming grin.
The Prince, who considered that Connie Bawtry had held the stage for long enough, said that for himself he preferred ethics to religious creeds, and added that the narrow-mindedness of the Church had done much to bring Bolshevism into power. No one showed the smallest desire to argue the point, and Tom Bawtry, seizing the opportunity thus afforded of starting a less objectionable topic, leaned across Mary to ask the Prince whether he had been mixed up in the Russian Revolution. The Prince smiled somewhat cynically, and replied: ‘Merely, I lost my all.’
Any sympathy that might have been expressed was nipped in the bud by Mrs Bawtry, who said that worldly possessions were only dross, and that she knew many people who had given up their all to the Group Movement. Naturally, the Prince was not going to stand this kind of thing, and he said, with just as firm a smile as hers, that making voluntary sacrifices was very different from being stripped bare of your every possession, and cast into prison into the bargain.
This was quite unanswerable, and had the effect of making the Prince at once the centre of attraction. Ermyntrude begged him, in a proprietary tone, to tell the rest of her guests about his dreadful experiences, and he at once began to do so, in a whimsical way which even Connie Bawtry thought very touching, and which made every man present feel a little unwell.
Hugh, who had the advantage of being acquainted with several distinguished Russians, had written the Prince down as spurious within twenty minutes of first setting eyes on him, and could not now resist the temptation of asking him one or two rather awkward questions. The Prince, however, proved to be most adroit in sliding out of uncomfortable corners, and had no difficulty in holding the interest of the female half of his audience. Tom Bawtry, too, who never expected any foreigner to be anything but grotesque, was considerably impressed, and exclaimed at intervals: ‘By Jove!’ and: ‘Extraordinary fellers those Bolshies must be!’
The thought of the Prince’s immeasurable losses had always the power to bring a little spring of tears to Ermyntrude’s eyes, but Connie Bawtry’s sympathy found a more practical expression. At the earliest opportunity, she told the Prince that if he would only put himself under God-control he would find that all his troubles would vanish. In proof of this statement, she cited the case of a certain business man, who (she said) was actually losing money when he got Changed. ‘But now,’ she said, ‘he’s absolutely God-controlled, and his whole business has taken a turn for the better, and he’s actually doing very well indeed.’
Only two of her hearers appeared to be gratified by this uplifting reflection. Hugh said: ‘Connie, I love you dearly; in fact, I regard you almost in the light of an aunt, but you do utter the most repellent remarks.’
‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Wally facetiously. ‘It sounds pretty good to me. You’d better try it, Prince.’
‘Why, it’s like a miracle, isn’t it?’ said Ermyntrude, looking round with a beaming smile. ‘Fancy!’
For an almost imperceptible moment Hugh’s eyes met Mary’s across the table. Vicky’s voice, holding an imperious note, recalled his attention. ‘Crack these for me, please.’
He took the walnuts from her, and stretched out his hand for the nut-crackers. She said rather belligerently: ‘I suppose you don’t believe in miracles?’
‘Not that kind of miracle. Do you?’
‘Oh, I think it’s lovely!’
He peeled one of the nuts, and gave it back to her. Feeling her last remark to be quite unworthy of being replied to, he said nothing.
Vicky put her elbows on the table, and began to nibble the nut. ‘Lawyers never believe anything. You are a lawyer, aren’t you?’
‘Barrister.’
‘Oh well, it’s just the same. Fusty.’
He glanced down at her. ‘Thanks a lot! Where did you learn your pretty manners?’
A sudden gurgle escaped her. ‘Absolute truth!’
He smiled, but said softly: ‘Careful! What makes you think barristers are fusty?’
‘Oh, they all are!’
‘Of course, you know so many.’ He saw her hunch one bare shoulder, and added: ‘Come off it, Vicky! You’re forgetting that I knew you when you were a skinny brat with a band round your teeth. It won’t wash.’
‘I must have been rather sweet,’ she said reflectively.
‘You weren’t. You were a little pest.’
‘I think it’s so remembering and marvellous of you to know what I was like,’ she said. ‘I thought you were most frightfully grown-up and dull. In fact, I was rather hazy about you till I saw you tonight, and then, of course, it all came back to me. You haven’t altered a bit.’
‘You know, you have a real talent for small-talk,’ said Hugh. ‘Sorry I can’t return your compliment!’
‘Sorry?’ repeated Vicky, raising a pair of startled eyes to his face. ‘But don’t you think I’m much, much prettier now? Everyone else does!’
‘You wouldn’t be so bad if you hadn’t plastered so much make-up on your face,’ he replied coolly.
‘Ah, yes!’ she said, recovering her balance in a flash. ‘I thought you were rather the sort of man who’d prefer a violet by a mossy stone. Probably I shall be putting on that act one day.’
He regarded her from under brows lifted in faint surprise. ‘Is your incredible life a series of “acts”?’ he inquired.
