“But I must disappoint you, my Lord, and say that never for one moment has there been a woman who could have deflected me from my chosen path! Quite frankly, if I am honest, there has never been a woman who, if it came to a choice between her and my work, has not been easily dispensable.”

“Perhaps one day – ” Lord Stratford began tentatively.

Lord Castleford interrupted him.

“I know what you are going to say, but the answer is ‘no’! Some men are self-sufficient in themselves and I am one of them. A woman is a plaything.”

He paused to say almost provocatively,

“In my opinion the Sultan has entirely the right idea. He keeps his toys locked up in a cupboard where only he can take them out to play with them and where he need not even think about them when he has other more important matters on his mind.”

“That is an Oriental outlook,” Lord Stratford remarked.

“Which has much to commend it,” Lord Castleford answered. “Think how much easier our task would be if there were no Lady Ellenboroughs taking a Royal lover or upsetting a country by running away with an Albanian General!”

He paused to go on,

“Do you not imagine that diplomacy in Paris would be far less complicated if Napoleon III were not obsessed by his mistresses? Their number is legion and each one makes him less effective as an Emperor and more vulnerable to public resentment.”

He looked at the Ambassador for a moment before he said,

“You do not agree with me?”

“I was just wondering,” Lord Stratford replied, “whether you are at heart a puritan or a prude.”

“I am neither!” Lord Castleford replied. “I am an extremely practical man who sees his duty to his country as a straight clear road ahead of him. I have no wish to linger amongst the flowers by the roadside. If I occasionally stop to pick one, I know it will fade quickly and will not become an encumbrance to delay my progress unduly.”

He smiled at the look on the Ambassador’s face as he went on,

“Women are the flowers of life. Once one has picked them, one expects nothing but that they should fade and eventually die.”

“It is extraordinary!” Lord Stratford said. “I can say quite honestly, Vernon, that you shock me. I did not expect to find in you, my most brilliant and favoured pupil, a man so cynical, one who appears to have an almost jaded view of life.”

“I promise you I am not jaded!” Lord Castleford replied. “Cynical, perhaps – practical, yes – and strictly unromantic!”

“The Athenian women are very beautiful!” Lord Stratford said softly.

“I shall look on them with pleasure!” Lord Castleford replied.

“And Paris, you will find, is filled with the most deliberately alluring women the world has ever known.”