We sent word to Windlehurst to join us, you remember, but he won't come now; it's too late.

So, we'll go, if you like." She half rose, but the door of the box opened, and Lord Windlehurst looked in quizzically.

There was a smile on his face.
"I'm late, I know; but you'll forgive me--you'll forgive me, dear lady," he added to Hylda, "for I've been listening to your husband making a smashing speech for a bad cause." Hylda smiled.

"Then I must go and congratulate him," she answered, and withdrew her hand from that of Lord Windlehurst, who seemed to hold it longer than usual, and pressed it in a fatherly way.
"I'm afraid the House is up," he rejoined, as Hylda turned for her opera-cloak; "and I saw Eglington leave Palace Yard as I came away." He gave a swift, ominous glance towards the Duchess, which Hylda caught, and she looked at each keenly.
"It's seldom I sit in the Peers' Gallery," continued Windlehurst; "I don't like going back to the old place much.

It seems empty and hollow.
But I wouldn't have missed Eglington's fighting speech for a good deal." "What was it about ?" asked Hylda as they left the box.