'Find out what?'
'Whether the Prince and the Emperor are there.'
'Send John to ask,' suggested the husband.
'He would be sure to make a blunder about it. If you'd go yourself you'd learn the truth in a minute. Have a cab,--just go into the hall and you'll soon know how it all is;--I'd do it in a minute if I were you.' Sir Damask was the most good-natured man in the world, but he did not like the job. 'What can be the objection?' asked his wife.
'Go to a man's house and find out whether a man's guests are come before you go yourself! I don't just see it, Ju.'
'Guests! What nonsense! The Emperor and all the Royal Family! As if it were like any other party. Such a thing, probably, never happened before, and never will happen again. If you don't go, Damask, I must; and I will.' Sir Damask, after groaning and smoking for half a minute, said that he would go. He made many remonstrances. It was a confounded bore. He hated emperors and he hated princes. He hated the whole box and dice of that sort of thing! He 'wished to goodness' that he had dined at his club and sent word up home that the affair was to be off. But at last he submitted and allowed his wife to leave the room with the intention of sending for a cab. The cab was sent for and announced, but Sir Damask would not stir till he had finished his big cigar.
It was past ten when he left his own house. On arriving in Grosvenor Square he could at once see that the party was going on. The house was illuminated. There was a concourse of servants round the door, and half the square was already blocked up with carriages.
It was not without delay that he got to the door, and when there he saw the royal liveries. There was no doubt about the party. The Emperor and the Princes and the Princesses were all there. As far as Sir Damask could then perceive, the dinner had been quite a success. But again there was a delay in getting away, and it was nearly eleven before he could reach home. 'It's all right,' said he to his wife. 'They're there, safe enough.'
'You are sure that the Emperor is there.'
'As sure as a man can be without having seen him.'
Miss Longestaffe was present at this moment, and could not but resent what appeared to be a most unseemly slur cast upon her friends. 'I don't understand it at all,' she said. 'Of course the Emperor is there. Everybody has known for the last month that he was coming. What is the meaning of it, Julia?'