“Excellent!” Sir Timothy murmured.  “Let me try one of your cigarettes.”

“Everything ready for the great show to-morrow night?” Francis asked, as he served the cocktails.

“Everything is in order.  I wonder, really,” Sir Timothy went on, looking at Francis curiously, “what you expect to see?”

“I don’t think we any of us have any definite idea,” Francis replied.  “We have all, of course, made our guesses.”

“You will probably be disappointed,” Sir Timothy warned him.  “For some reason or other—­perhaps I have encouraged the idea —­people look upon my parties as mysterious orgies where things take place which may not be spoken of.  They are right to some extent.  I break the law, without a doubt, but I break it, I am afraid, in rather a disappointing fashion.”

A limousine covered in dust raced in at the open gates and came to a standstill with a grinding of brakes.  Lady Cynthia stepped lightly out and came across the lawn to them.

“I am hot and dusty and I was disagreeable,” she confided, “but the peace of this wonderful place, and the sight of that beautiful silver thing have cheered me.  May I have a cocktail before I go up to change?  I am a little late, I know,” she went. on, “but that wretched garden-party!  I thought my turn would never come to receive my few words.  Mother would have been broken-hearted if I had left without them.  What slaves we are to royalty!  Now shall I hurry and change?  You men have the air of wanting your dinner, and I am rather that way myself.  You look tired, dear host,” she added, a little hesitatingly.

“The heat,” he answered.

“Why you ever leave this spot I can’t imagine,” she declared, as she turned away, with a lingering glance around.  “It seems like Paradise to come here and breathe this air.  London is like a furnace.”

The two men were alone again.  In Francis’ pocket were the two documents, which he had not yet made up his mind how to use.  Margaret came out to them presently, and he strolled away with her towards the rose garden.

“Margaret,” he said, “is it my fancy or has there been a change in your father during the last few days?”

“There is a change of some sort,” she admitted.  “I cannot describe it.  I only know it is there.  He seems much more thoughtful and less hard.  The change would be an improvement,” she went on, “except that somehow or other it makes me feel uneasy.  It is as though he were grappling with some crisis.”

They came to a standstill at the end of the pergola, where the masses of drooping roses made the air almost faint with their perfume.  Margaret stretched out her hand, plucked a handful of the creamy petals and held them against her cheek.  A thrush was singing noisily.  A few yards away they heard the soft swish of the river.

“Tell me,” she asked curiously, “my father still speaks of you as being in some respects an enemy.  What does he mean?”