"
"What about your house party?" Julian enquired, with bland
irrelevance.
"All arrived. I suppose they'll be down directly. Mr. Hannaway
Wells is here."
"Good old Wells!" Julian murmured. "How does he look since he
became a Cabinet Minister?"
"Portentous," Lady Maltenby replied; with a smile. "He doesn't
look as though he would ever unbend. Then the Shervintons are
here, and the Princess Torski--your friend Miss Abbeway's aunt."
"The Princess Torski?" Julian repeated. "Who on earth is she?"
"She was English," his mother explained, "a cousin of the
Abbeways. She married in Russia and is on her way now to France
to meet her husband, who is in command of a Russian battalion
there. She seems quite a pleasant person, but not in the least
like her niece."
"Miss Abbeway is still here, of course?"
"Naturally. I asked her for a week, and I think she means to
stay. We talked for an hour after tea this afternoon, and I found
her most interesting. She has been living in England for years,
it seems, down in Chelsea, studying sculpture."
"She is a remarkably clever young woman," Julian said
thoughtfully, "but a little incomprehensible. If the Princess
Torski is her aunt, who were her parents?"
"Her father," the Countess replied, "was Colonel Richard Abbeway,
who seems to have been military attache at St. Petersburg, years
ago. He married a sister of the Princess Torski's husband, and
from her this young woman inherited a title which she won't use
and a large fortune.
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