She could not quite understand why she should feel pleased at his coming--pleased as well as flushed. She was acquainted with peers by the dozen and with the sons of peers by the score, and yet somehow now she felt as if she were distinctly flattered. That was why she asked him how he was and apologised for the absence of her mother. (Lady Severn had left her daughter in possession of the drawing-room when Mr. Bateman was talking about his Duchesses: she pretended that she had an appointment which it was necessary to keep.) CHAPTER XVII Lord Lullworth, while he was drinking his tea and admiring to the full the exquisite electrical apparatus by which it was prepared, was giving some attention to the other young men--Mr. Richmond might possibly still be thought of by some people as a young man--who occupied chairs or stools around Miss Severn’s seat. Guy Overton he knew pretty well, and he had never pretended that he thought highly of his talents--by talents Lord Lullworth meant his seat on a pony something between twelve and thirteen hands high--or of his disposition. (He had heard of his habitually dining at a greasy Italian restaurant and drinking Chianti in half flasks.) He knew nothing about the other men, but he knew instinctively that he would never think much of them. And then they began to talk, and she actually listened to them and pretended that she was interested in what they were talking about--he was anxious to think the best of her, so he took it for granted that her attention to what they were saying was only simulated. He was not fond of hearing himself talk, so he did not feel all left out in the cold while the others were--well, the exact word that was in his mind as he listened to them was the word “jabbering.” They were jabbering, the whole racket of them, weren’t they?