“Your pardon, ma’am, if I am late,” Tina said feeling suddenly shy as all the guests turned their eyes upon her.
“One is always prepared to await the arrival of Persephone,” Sir Marcus said and Tina thought that he looked not unlike the Prince of Hades himself coming from the underworld as he bent over her hand to kiss it and his dark plum-coloured velvet coat seemed to cast a sombre note among the brighter creations of his friends.
Yet his buttons sparkled with huge diamonds and there was a magnificent stone in his cravat and another in a signet ring on his little finger.
‘Rich! rich! rich!’ the words seemed to be whispered in the air all around her and Tina pulled her fingers from his as if the touch of his lips against her bare skin was almost too repulsive to be borne. As always he
