This morning he amazed me. He knew the right people
and did the right things - carried himself too like a man who is
sure of himself. To-night he is simply a booby."
"Perhaps it is his evening clothes," Lady Tresham remarked, "they
take some getting used to, I believe."
"This morning," Ernestine said, "he had passed that stage altogether.
This is, I suppose, a relapse! Such a nuisance for you!"
Lady Tresham rose and smiled sweetly at the man who was taking her
in.
"Well, he is to be your charge, so I hope you may find him more
amusing than he looks," she answered.
It was an early dinner, to be followed by a visit to a popular
theatre. A few hours ago Trent was looking forward to his evening
with the keenest pleasure - now he was dazed - he could not readjust
his point of view to the new conditions. He knew very well that it
was his wealth, and his wealth only, which had brought him as an
equal amongst these people, all, so far as education and social
breeding was concerned, of so entirely a different sphere. He
looked around the table. What would they say if they knew? He
would be thrust out as an interloper. Opposite to him was a Peer
who was even then engaged in threading the meshes of the Bankruptcy
Court, what did they care for that? - not a whit! He was of their
order though he was a beggar.
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