Stafford laughed.
"We men always put our foot in it when we talk about a woman's dress,"
he said.
A moment after, the dinner was announced, and Sir Stephen, who had come
down at the last moment, as he went up to take in Lady Clansford,
nodded to Stafford, and smiled significantly. He was as carefully
dressed as usual, but on his face, and in his eyes particularly, was an
expression of satisfaction and anticipatory triumph which was too
obvious to escape the notice of but very few. He was not "loud" at
dinner, but talked even more fluently than usual, and once or twice his
fine eyes swept the long table with a victorious, masterful glance.
Directly the ladies had gone, the little knot of financiers drew up
nearer to their host, and Griffenberg raised his eyebrows
interrogatively.
Sir Stephen nodded.
"Yes," he said, in an undertone. "It's all right! I heard this morning.
My man will be down, with the final decision, by a special train which
ought to land him about midnight. We'll meet in the library, say at
half past twelve, and get the thing finished, eh, baron?"
Wirsch grunted approval.
"Vare goot, Sare Stephen; dee sooner a ting ees congluded, de bedder.
'Arf bast dwelve!"
There was but a short stay made in the drawing-room, and before ten
o'clock the guests streamed into the magnificent ball-room.
There were a number of the neighbouring gentry who were making their
acquaintance with the Villa for the first time, and they regarded the
splendour around them with an amazement which was not without reason;
for to-night the artistically designed and shaded electric lamps, the
beautiful rooms with their chaste yet effective decorations, on which
money had been lavished like water, were seen to their greatest
advantage; and the Vaynes, the Bannerdales, and the local gentry
generally exchanged glances and murmured exclamations of surprise and
admiration, and wondered whether there could be any end to the wealth
of a man who could raise such a palace in so short a time.
From the gallery of white-and-gold the famous band, every man of which
was a musician, presently began to send forth the sweet strains of a
Waldteufel waltz, and Stafford found Lady Clansford for the first
dance. Though he had paid little attention to Howard's remarks about
Maude Falconer, he remembered them, and he did not ask her for a dance
until the ball had been running about an hour; then he went up to where
she was standing talking to Lord Bunnerdale, her last partner. His
lordship and Stafford had already met, and Lord Bannerdale, who admired
and liked Stafford, nodded pleasantly.