Hyacinth was by this time less embarrassed than when he had presented himself, but he was not less mystified; he wondered afresh if he were not being practised on for some inconceivable end: so strangely did it strike him that two such products of another world than his own should of their own movement take the trouble to explain each other to a dire little bookbinder. This idea made him flush; it might have come over him that he had fallen into a trap. He was conscious he looked frightened, and he was conscious the moment afterwards that the Princess noticed it. This was apparently what made her say: “If you’ve lost so much of the play I ought to tell you what has happened.” “Do you think he would follow that any more?” Madame Grandoni asked. “If you would tell me—if you would tell me—!” And then Hyacinth stopped. He had been going to say “If you would tell me what all this means and what you want of me it would be more to the point!” but the words died on his lips and he sat staring, for the woman at his right hand was simply too beautiful. She was too beautiful to question, to judge by common logic; and how could he know, moreover, what was natural to a person in that exaltation of grace and splendour? Perhaps it was her habit to send out every evening for some witless stranger to amuse her; perhaps that was the way the foreign aristocracy lived. There was no sharpness in her face—for the present hour at least: there was nothing but luminous charity, yet she looked as if she knew what was going on in his mind. She made no eager attempt to reassure him, but there was a world almost of direct tenderness in the tone in which she said: “Do you know I’m afraid I’ve already forgotten what they have been doing—? It’s terribly complicated; some one or other was hurled over a precipice.” “Ah, you’re a brilliant pair,” Madame Grandoni declared with a laugh of long experience. “I could describe everything. The person who was hurled over the precipice was the virtuous hero, and you’ll see him in the next act all the better for it.” “Don’t describe anything; I’ve so much to ask.” Hyacinth had looked away in tacit deprecation at hearing himself “paired” with the Princess, and he felt she was watching him. “What do you think of Captain Sholto?” she went on suddenly, to his surprise, if anything in his position could excite surprise more than anything else; and as he hesitated, not knowing what to say, she added: “Isn’t he a very curious type?” “I know him very little.” But he had no sooner uttered the words than it struck him they were far from brilliant, were poor and flat and very little calculated to satisfy the Princess. Indeed he had said nothing at all that could place him in a favourable light; so he continued at a venture: “I mean I’ve never seen him at home.” That sounded still more silly.