The Duke certainly was an old man, if a man turned of seventy be old;—­and he was a man too who did not bear his years with hearty strength.  He moved slowly, and turned his limbs, when he did turn them, as though the joints were stiff in their sockets.  But there was nevertheless about him a dignity of demeanour, a majesty of person, and an upright carriage which did not leave an idea of old age as the first impress on the minds of those who encountered the Duke of Omnium.  He was tall and moved without a stoop; and though he moved slowly, he had learned to seem so to do because it was the proper kind of movement for one so high up in the world as himself.  And perhaps his tailor did something for him.  He had not been long under Madame Max Goesler’s eyes before she perceived that his tailor had done a good deal for him.  When he alluded to his own age and to her youth, she said some pleasant little word as to the difference between oak-trees and currant-bushes; and by that time she was seated comfortably on her sofa, and the Duke was on a chair before her,—­just as might have been any man who was not a Duke.

After a little time the photograph was brought forth from his Grace’s pocket.  That bringing out and giving of photographs, with the demand for counter photographs, is the most absurd practice of the day.  “I don’t think I look very nice, do I?” “Oh yes,—­very nice, but a little too old; and certainly you haven’t got those spots all over your forehead.  These are the remarks which on such occasions are the most common.  It may be said that to give a photograph or to take a photograph without the utterance of some words which would be felt by a bystander to be absurd, is almost an impossibility.  At this moment there was no bystander, and therefore the Duke and the lady had no need for caution.  Words were spoken that were very absurd.  Madame Goesler protested that the Duke’s photograph was more to her than the photographs of all the world beside; and the Duke declared that he would carry the lady’s picture next to his heart,—­I am afraid he said for ever and ever.  Then he took her hand and pressed it, and was conscious that for a man over seventy years of age he did that kind of thing very well.

“You will come and dine with me, Duke?” she said, when he began to talk of going.

“I never dine out.”

“That is just the reason you should dine with me.  You shall meet nobody you do not wish to meet.”

“I would so much rather see you in this way,—­I would indeed.  I do dine out occasionally, but it is at big formal parties, which I cannot escape without giving offence.”

“And you cannot escape my little not formal party,—­without giving offence.”  She looked into his face as she spoke, and he knew that she meant it.  And he looked into hers, and thought that her eyes were brighter than any he was in the habit of seeing in these latter days.  “Name your own day, Duke.  Will a Sunday suit you?”