“They all look like that off the stage,” the duchess assured indifferently. “They are nothing but footlight beauties: they look ghastly off the boards. I dare say that Letty Lane _is_ ill, though; the pace she goes would kill anybody. Have some more tea?” He held out his cup and agreed with her. “She works too hard—this playing almost every night, singing and dancing twice at the matinées, I should think she would be dead.” “Oh, I don’t mean her professional engagements,” murmured the duchess. A revolt such as had stung him when they criticized her at the Carlton rose in him now. “It is hard to believe,” he said, “when you hear her sing that dove song and that cradle song.” But his companion’s laugh stopped his championship short. “You dear boy, don’t be a silly, Dan. She doesn’t need your pity or your good opinion. She is perfectly satisfied. She has got a fortune in Poniotowsky, and she really is ‘a perfect terror,’ you know.” Affected slightly by her cold dismissal of his subject, he paused for a moment. But his own point of view was too strong to be shaken by this woman’s light words. “I suppose if she wasn’t from my town—” At his words the vision of Letty Lane with the coral strands on her dress, came before his eyes, and he said honestly: “But I do take an interest in her just the same, and she’s going to pieces, that’s clear. Something ought to be done.” The Duchess of Breakwater was very much annoyed. “Are you going to talk about her all the time?” she asked with sharp sweetness. “You are not very flattering, Dan.” And he returned peacefully, “Why, I thought you might be able to help her in some way or another.” “_Me!_” She laughed aloud. “Me help Letty Lane? Really—” “Why, you might get her to sing out here,” he suggested. “That would sort of get hold of her; women know how to do those things.” His preposterous simplicity overwhelmed her. She stirred her tea, and said, controlling herself, “Why, what on earth would you have me to say to Letty Lane?” “Oh, just be nice to her,” he suggested. “Tell her to take care of herself and to brace up. Get some nice woman to—” The duchess helped him. “To reform her?” “Do her good,” the boy said gently. “You’re too silly for words. If you were not such a hopeless child I would be furious with you. Why, my dear boy, she would laugh in your face and in mine.” As the duchess left the tea-table she repeated: “Is this what you came up from London to talk to me about?” And at the touch of her dress as she passed him—at the look she gave him from her eyes, Dan flushed and said honestly: “Why, I told you that she was the only thing that kept me from thinking about you all the time.” CHAPTER IX—DISAPPOINTMENT