A certain appearance of embarrassment spread over Mrs Hipgrave’s face. ‘We’re old friends, Lord Wheatley,’ she said at last. I bowed in grateful recognition. ‘I’m sure you won’t mind if I speak plainly to you. Now is she the sort of person whom you would be really wise to marry? Remember, your wife will be Lady Wheatley.’ ‘I had not forgotten that that would happen,’ I said. ‘I’m told,’ pursued Mrs Hipgrave in a somewhat scornful tone, ‘that she is very pretty.’ ‘But, then, that’s not really of importance, is it?’ I murmured. Mrs Hipgrave looked at me with just a touch of suspicion; but she went on bravely: ‘And one or two very curious things have been said.’ ‘Not to me,’ I observed with infinite amiability. ‘Her family now--’ ‘Her family was certainly a drawback; but there are no more of them, Mrs Hipgrave.’ ‘Then somebody told me that she was in the habit of wearing--’ ‘Dear me, Mrs Hipgrave, in these days everybody does that--more or less, you know.’ Mrs Hipgrave sighed pathetically, and added, with a slight shudder: ‘They say she carried a dagger.’ ‘They’ll say anything,’ I reminded her. ‘At any rate,’ said Mrs Hipgrave, ‘she will be quite unused to the ways of society.’ ‘Oh, we shall teach her, we shall teach her,’ said I cheerfully. ‘After all, it’s only a difference of method. When people in Neopalia are annoyed, they put a knife into you--’ ‘Good gracious, Lord Wheatley!’ ‘Here,’ I pursued, ‘they congratulate you; but it’s the same principle. Won’t you wish me joy, Mrs Hipgrave?’ ‘If you’re really bent upon it, I suppose I must.’ ‘And you’ll tell the dear children?’ I asked anxiously. ‘The dear children?’ she echoed; she certainly suspected me by now. ‘Why, yes. Your daughter and Bennett Hamlyn, you know.’ Mrs Hipgrave surveyed me from top to toe. Her aspect was very severe; then she delivered herself of the following remark: ‘I can never be sufficiently thankful,’ she said, with eyes upturned towards the sky, ‘that my poor dear girl found out her mistake in time.’ ‘I have the utmost regard for Miss Beatrice,’ I rejoined, ‘but I will not differ from you, Mrs Hipgrave.’ * * * * *