Mrs. Delarayne began to examine her rings very studiously, as if she wished to make quite certain that none of the stones had gone astray in the last five minutes. "It's all very well, Joseph," she observed quietly; "but if Lord Henry goes--I go. Now understand that once and for all. I can't endure London without him." "Not really?" he ejaculated, leaning forward. "Are you serious? D'you mean Lord Henry, the biologist or something?" Mrs. Delarayne continued the close scrutiny of her rings. "Of course I mean it," she said in the same quiet but utterly unanswerable way. "You have no idea what Lord Henry means to me. He's literally the only young man in London who does not treat me as if I were a creature of mediaeval antiquity." Sir Joseph crestfallen sank back again hopelessly into the cushions. Mrs. Delarayne proceeded to explain that owing to the meddlesomeness of some officious busybody on the Executive Council of the Society for Anthropological Research--an old maid she felt certain--Lord Henry Highbarn had been invited to go to Central China as the Society's plenipotentiary, in order to investigate the reasons of China's practical immunity from lunacy and nervous diseases of all kinds. Lord Henry had accepted the honour and was leaving in three months' time. She then picked up the newspaper, and read aloud the concluding paragraph of the article on the subject: "His departure from this country will be a severe blow to the hundreds of nervous invalids who annually benefit from his skill at his Sanatorium in Kent, and the world of science will find it difficult to replace him. It appears that Lord Henry has one or two ardent disciples who will be in a position to carry on his great work, but a leading London specialist, Dr. David Melhado, declared to our representative to-day, that without the guidance of Lord Henry's brilliant and original genius, it is doubtful whether any of his pupils will ever dare to treat the more obscure nervous cases on their master's drastic and unprecedented lines." "There now!" she cried, crumpling up the paper and throwing it away. "You see what that means. It means that women like myself are once more to be condemned to the dangerous misunderstanding to which we were exposed before Lord Henry came on the scene. And we certainly can't survive it." Sir Joseph surveyed his companion's robust figure and healthy countenance for some seconds, and an incredulous smile gradually spread over his flushed and puffy features. "Surely there can't be very much wrong with you--is there?" he dared to suggest for once.