Publisher's Synopsis
"Hullo! No!--Yes!--upon my soul, it is Jacob! Why, Delafield, my dear fellow, how are you?" So saying--on a February evening a good many years ago--an elderly gentleman in evening dress flung himself out of his cab, which had just stopped before a house in Bruton Street, and hastily went to meet a young man who was at the same moment stepping out of another hansom a little farther down the pavement. The pleasure in the older man's voice rang clear, and the younger met him with an equal cordiality, expressed perhaps through a manner more leisurely and restrained. "So you are home, Sir Wilfrid? You were announced, I saw. But I thought Paris would have detained you a bit." "Paris? Not I! Half the people I ever knew there are dead, and the rest are uncivil. Well, and how are you getting on? Making your fortune, eh?" And, slipping his arm inside the young man's, the speaker walked back with him, along a line of carriages, towards a house which showed a group of footmen at its open door. Jacob Delafield smiled. "The business of a land agent seems to be to spend some one else's--as far as I've yet gone." "Land agent! I thought you were at the bar?" "I was, but the briefs didn't come in. My cousin offered me the care of his Essex estates. I like the country--always have. So I thought I'd better accept." "What--the Duke? Lucky fellow! A regular income, and no anxieties. I expect you're pretty well paid?" "Oh, I'm not badly paid," replied the young man, tranquilly. "Of course you're going to Lady Henry's?" "Of course. Here we are." The older man paused outside the line of servants waiting at the door, and spoke in a lower tone. "How is she? Failing at all?" Jacob Delafield hesitated. "She's grown very blind--and perhaps rather more infirm, generally. But she is at home, as usual--every evening for a few people, and for a good many on Wednesdays." "Is she still alone--or is there any relation who looks after her?" "Relation? No. She detests them all." "Except you?"
