She was the only daughter of Iquist's brother, who had had a business
and a palace at Lima. At the age of eighteen, her last surviving
parent being dead, she had come to London and started to keep house
for the bachelor Iquist, who at that very moment, owing to a fortunate
change in the Ministry, had humorously entered the Cabinet. These two
had immediately become "the most talked-of pair in London," London in
this phrase signifying the few thousand people who do talk about
the doings of other people unknown to them and being neither kings,
princes, statesmen, artistes, artists, jockeys, nor poisoners. The
Iquists had led the semi-intelligent, conscious-of-its-audience set
which had ousted the old, quite unintelligent stately-homes-of-England
set from the first place in the curiosity of the everlasting public.
Concepcion had wit. It was stated that she furnished her uncle with
the finest of his _mots_. When Iquist died, of course poor Concepcion
had retired to the upper part, whence, though her position was
naturally weakened, she still took a hand in leading the set.

G.J. had grown friendly and appreciative of her, for the simple reason
that she had singled him out and always tried to please him, even when
taking liberties with him. He liked her because she was different from
her set. She had a masculine mind, whereas many even of the males of
her set had a feminine mind. She was exceedingly well educated; she
had ideas on everything; and she never failed in catching an allusion.
She would criticise her set very honestly; her attitude to it and
to herself seemed to be that of an impartial and yet indulgent
philosopher; withal she could be intensely loyal to fools and worse
who were friends. As for the public, she was apparently convinced of
the sincerity of her scorn for it, while admitting that she enjoyed
publicity, which had become indispensable to her as a drug may become