“Oh, well,” said the Duchess, shrugging her shoulders, “how can you always be perfectly straightforward with such a tyrannical old person!  She has to be managed.  Lately, in order to be sure of every minute of Julie’s time, she has taken to heaping work upon her to such a ridiculous extent that unless I come to the rescue the poor thing gets no rest and no amusement.  And last summer there was an explosion, because Julie, who was supposed to be in Paris for her holiday with a school-friend, really spent a week of it with the Buncombes, Lady Henry’s married niece, who has a place in Kent.  The Buncombes knew her at Lady Henry’s parties, of course.  Then they met her in the Louvre, took her about a little, were delighted with her, and begged her to come and stay with them—­they have a place near Canterbury—­on the way home.  They and Julie agreed that it would be best to say nothing to Lady Henry about it—­she is too absurdly jealous—­but then it leaked out, unluckily, and Lady Henry was furious.”

“I must say,” said Delafield, hurriedly, “I always thought frankness would have been best there.”

“Well, perhaps,” said the Duchess, unwillingly, with another shrug.  “But now what is to be done?  Lady Henry really must behave better, or Julie can’t and sha’n’t stay with her.  Julie has a great following—­hasn’t she, Jacob?  They won’t see her harassed to death.”

“Certainly not,” said Delafield.  “At the same time we all see”—­he turned to Sir Wilfrid—­“what the advantages of the present combination are.  Where would Lady Henry find another lady of Mademoiselle Le Breton’s sort to help her with her house and her salon?  For the last two years the Wednesday evenings have been the most brilliant and successful things of their kind in London.  And, of course, for Mademoiselle Le Breton it is a great thing to have the protection of Lady Henry’s name—­”

“A great thing?” cried Sir Wilfrid.  “Everything, my dear Jacob!”

“I don’t know,” said Delafield, slowly.  “It may be bought too dear.”

Sir Wilfrid looked at the speaker with curiosity.  It had been at all times possible to rouse Jacob Delafield—­as child, as school-boy, as undergraduate—­from an habitual carelessness and idleness by an act or a tale of injustice or oppression.  Had the Duchess pressed him into her service, and was he merely taking sides for the weaker out of a natural bent towards that way of looking at things?  Or—­

“Well, certainly we must do our best to patch it up,” said Sir Wilfrid, after a pause.  “Perhaps Mademoiselle Le Breton will allow me a word with her by-and-by.  I think I have still some influence with Lady Henry.  But, dear goddaughter”—­he bent forward and laid his hand on that of the Duchess—­“don’t let the maid do the commissions.”

“But I must!” cried the Duchess.  “Just think, there is my big bazaar on the 16th.  You don’t know how clever Julie is at such things.  I want to make her recite—­her French is too beautiful!  And then she has such inventiveness, such a head!  Everything goes if she takes it in hand.  But if I say anything to Aunt Flora, she’ll put a spoke in all our wheels.  She’ll hate the thought of anything in which Julie is successful and conspicuous.  Of course she will!”