He took her card, though he hesitated.
"If he does not see me," she added, "he will be very much displeased."
"Will you come in, ma'am, and take a seat for a moment?" he
ventured. "I will inquire."
The great hall was one of London's most celebrated. A magnificent
staircase swept up from it to landings whose walls were hung
with tapestries the world knew. In a gilded chair, like a throne,
Mademoiselle Valle sat and waited.
But she did not wait long. The serious-looking man without livery
returned almost immediately. He led Mademoiselle into a room
like a sort of study or apartment given up to business matters.
Mademoiselle Valle had never seen Lord Coombe's ceremonial evening
effect more flawless. Tall, thin and finely straight, he waited
in the centre of the room. He was evidently on the point of going
out, and the light-textured satin-lined overcoat he had already
thrown on revealed, through a suggestion of being winged, that he
wore in his lapel a delicately fresh, cream-coloured carnation.
A respectable, middle-class looking man with a steady,
blunt-featured face, had been talking to him and stepped quietly
aside as Mademoiselle entered. There seemed to be no question of
his leaving the room.
Coombe met his visitor half way:
"Something has alarmed you very much?" he said.
"Robin went out with Fraulein Hirsch this afternoon," she said
quickly.
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