“I don’t mind, old girl,” he said, “I don’t mind,” and the innocence of his eyes continued. Then as though something else were battling within him he began abruptly: “Maria, have you got a full list of the people who are coming to-night? I thought not. I’m sorry to have to speak of it again, I told you when we first came to town, and I’ve told you fifty times since, that I can do nothing without such a list.” “But I’ve got it,” she said, in great suffering, “I’ve got it, Charles.” His eyes changed again. “You’ve got what?” “The list of the people who are coming, Charles.” “Oh ... I didn’t understand. The list of the people who are coming,” he repeated slowly. “Well, show it to me in a moment.” He moved towards the door. “I’ll come with you,” she said. For the first time since her husband had decided to enter Parliament and had entered it, twenty years before, while their child was still alive, Lady Repton had to take a decision of importance. She decided in favour of the dinner. It was too late to change it, and she must trust to chance, but evidently some terrible thing had befallen the Warden of the Court of Dowry. As he was dressing she heard him now and then humming a chance tune (a thing which in his normal self he would no more have dreamed of doing than of walking the streets without his hat) and now and then commenting upon the character and attributes of the opera singer whom he had last heard sing it. She heard him launch out into a long monologue, describing the exact career of the new soprano at Covent Garden, the name of her father and her mother, the name of the Russian Grand Duke, the name of a wealthy English lady who had asked her (and him) to supper, and then, oh horror! the name of an English statesman. There was a burst of laughter which Lady Repton could hardly bear: and then a silence. When they met again and their guests had begun to come he seemed right enough, except that now and then he would say things which every one in the room knew well enough to be true, but which were by no means suitable to the occasion. It was thought eccentric in him, especially by those who knew him best, that he should comment somewhat upon what man was paired off with what woman in the procession, and it was thought exceedingly coarse by his partner that he should explain a strong itching upon his right ankle to be due, not to a flea, for his man was most careful, but to some little skin trouble. The noise of talking during the dinner covered any other indiscretions, and when the men were alone with him over the wine, he sat gloomily enough, evidently changed but guilty of nothing more exceptional than a complete ignorance of where the wine came from or what it was.