"You, Lady Muriel," he answered, with a slow smile, "are an
exception to all rules. No, you are a rule by yourself."
"To revert to the subject then for a moment," the Duchess said
stiffly. "You have made no progress with the Duke?"
"None whatever," Saxe Leinitzer admitted. "He was sufficiently
emphatic to inspire me with every caution. Even now I have doubts
as to whether I have altogether reassured him. I really believe,
dear Duchess, that we should be better off if you could persuade
him to go and live upon his estates."
The Duchess smiled grimly.
"Whilst the House of Lords exists," she remarked, "you will never
succeed in keeping Algernon away from London. He is always on the
point of making a speech, although he never does it."
"I have heard of that speech," Lady Carey drawled, from her low
seat. "It is to be a thoroughly enlightening affair. All the
great social questions are to be permanently disposed of. The
Prime Minister will come on his knees and beg Algernon to take his
place."
The Duchess looked up over her knitting.
"Algernon is at least in earnest," she remarked drily. "And he
has the good conscience of a clean living and honest man."
"What an unpleasant possession it must be," Lady Carey remarked
sweetly. "I disposed of my conscience finally many years ago.
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