III

The clock in the Warden's drawing-room had just struck eight, and
already the ducal feet were beautiful on the white bearskin hearthrug.
So slim and long were they, of instep so nobly arched, that only with
a pair of glazed ox-tongues on a breakfast-table were they comparable.
Incomparable quite, the figure and face and vesture of him who ended
in them.

The Warden was talking to him, with all the deference of elderly
commoner to patrician boy. The other guests--an Oriel don and his
wife--were listening with earnest smile and submissive droop, at a
slight distance. Now and again, to put themselves at their ease, they
exchanged in undertone a word or two about the weather.

"The young lady whom you may have noticed with me," the Warden was
saying, "is my orphaned grand-daughter." (The wife of the Oriel don
discarded her smile, and sighed, with a glance at the Duke, who was
himself an orphan.) "She has come to stay with me." (The Duke glanced
quickly round the room.) "I cannot think why she is not down yet."
(The Oriel don fixed his eyes on the clock, as though he suspected it
of being fast.) "I must ask you to forgive her. She appears to be a
bright, pleasant young woman."

"Married?" asked the Duke.

"No," said the Warden; and a cloud of annoyance crossed the boy's
face. "No; she devotes her life entirely to good works."