"I have no idea what a hero is like." Just then Lady Probyn came up, followed by an elderly harpy in spectacles and false, much-frizzed fringe.
"Mrs.Carsteen wishes to be introduced to you, Mr.Vaughan; she is a great admirer of your writings." And poor Derrick, who was then quite unused to the species, had to stand and receive a flood of the most fulsome flattery, delivered in a strident voice, and to bear the critical and prolonged stare of the spectacled eyes.

Nor would the harpy easily release her prey.

She kept him much against his will, and I saw him looking wistfully now and then towards Freda.
"It amuses me," I said to her, "that Derrick Vaughan should be so anxious to see Lord Starcross.

It reminds me of Charles Lamb's anxiety to see Kosciusko, 'for,' said he, 'I have never seen a hero; I wonder how they look,' while all the time he himself was living a life of heroic self-sacrifice." "Mr.Vaughan, I should think, need only look at his own brother," said Freda, missing the drift of my speech.
I longed to tell her what it was possible to tell of Derrick's life, but at that moment Sir Richard Merrifield introduced to his daughter a girl in a huge hat and great flopping sleeves, Miss Isaacson, whose picture at the Grosvenor had been so much talked of.

Now the little artist knew no one in the room, and Freda saw fit to be extremely friendly to her.
She was introduced to me, and I did my best to talk to her and set Freda at liberty as soon as the harpy had released Derrick; but my endeavours were frustrated, for Miss Isaacson, having looked me well over, decided that I was not at all intense, but a mere commonplace, slightly cynical worldling, and having exchanged a few lukewarm remarks with me, she returned to Freda, and stuck to her like a bur for the rest of the time.
We stood out on the balcony to see the troops go by.