Mr. Caryll was well and handsomely housed, as became the man of fashion, in the he had taken in Old Palace Yard. Knowing him from abroad, it was not impossible that the government—fearful of since the caused by the South Sea , and aware of an undercurrent of Jacobitism—might for a time, at least, keep an eye upon him. It him, therefore, to appear neither more nor less than a lounger, a gentleman of pleasure who had come to London in quest of diversion. To support this appearance, Mr. Caryll had sought out some friends of his in town. There were Stapleton and Collis, who had been at with him, and with whom he had ever since maintained a correspondence and a friendship. He sought them out on the very evening of his arrival—after his interview with Lord Ostermore. He had the satisfaction of being handsomely welcomed by them, and was under their guidance into the gaieties that the town afforded liberally for people of quality.  
Mr. Caryll was—as I hope you have gathered—an agreeable fellow, very free, moreover, with the contents of his well-equipped purse; and so you may conceive that the town showed him a very friendly, cordial . He fell into the habits of the men whose company he frequented; his days were as idle as theirs, and spent at the parade, the Ring, the play, the coffeehouse and the ordinary.
 
But under the gay he he carried a spirit of most unrest. The anger which had prompted his impulse to execute, after all, the business on which he was come, and to deliver his father the letter that was to work his ruin, was all spent. He had cooled, and cool it was idle for him to tell himself that Lord Ostermore, by his heartless to the crime of his early years, had proved himself of nothing but the pit Mr. Caryll had been sent to dig for him. There were moments when he sought to compel himself so to think, to steel himself against all other considerations. But it was idle. The reflection that the task before him was came ever to revolt him. To gain ease, the most that he could do—and he had the of it developed in a preternatural degree—was to put the business from him for the time, endeavor to forget it. And he had another matter to consider and to plague him—the matter of Hortensia Winthrop. He thought of her a great deal more than was good for his peace of mind, for all that he pretended to a gladness that things were as they were. Each morning that he lounged at the parade in St. James's Park, each evening that he visited the Ring, it was in the hope of some glimpse of her among the fashionable women that went abroad to see and to be seen. And on the third morning after his arrival the thing he hoped for came to pass.
 
It had happened that my lady had ordered her carriage that morning, dressed herself with the , which but set off the shortcomings of her lean and angular person, coiffed, pulvilled and topknotted, and she had sent a message amounting to a command to Mistress Winthrop that she should drive in the park with her.
 
Poor Hortensia, whose one desire was to hide her face from the town's uncharitable sight just then, fearing, indeed, that 's unscrupulous tongue would be as busy about her reputation as her ladyship had represented, attempted to assert herself by refusing to obey the command. It was in vain. Her ladyship with ambassadors, and went in person to convey her orders to her husband's , and to enforce them.
 
“What's this I am told?” quoth she, as she sailed into Hortensia's room. “Do my wishes count for nothing, that you send me pert answers by my woman?”
 
Hortensia rose. She had been sitting by the window, a book in her lap. “Not so, indeed, madam. Not pert, I trust. I am none so well, and I fear the sun.”
 
“'Tis little wonder,” laughed her ladyship; “and I'm glad on't, for it shows ye have a conscience somewhere. But 'tis no matter for that. I am tender for your reputation, mistress, and I'll not have you daylight like the guilty thing ye know yourself to be.”
 
“'Tis false, madam,” said Hortensia, with indignation. “Your ladyship knows it to be false.”
 
“Harkee, ninny, if you'd have the town believe it false, you'll show yourself—show that ye have no cause for shame, no cause to hide you from the eyes of honest folk. Come, girl; bid your woman get your and tippet. The carriage stays for us.”
 
To Hortensia her ladyship's seemed, after all, a good argument. Did she hide, what must the town think but that it confirmed the talk that she made no doubt was going round already. Better to go and brave it, and surely it should the backbiters if she showed herself in the park with Lord Rotherby's own mother.
 
It never occurred to her that this seeming tenderness for her reputation might be but wanton cruelty on her ladyship's part; a gratifying of her spleen against the girl by setting her in the of public sight to the end that she should experience the insult of glances and lips that smile with an of ; a desire to put down her pride and break the spirit which my lady accounted and stubborn.
 
Suspecting of this, she consented, and drove out with her ladyship as she was desired to do. But understanding of her ladyship's cruel , and of her own , were not long in following. Soon—very soon—she realized that anything would have been better than the she was forced to undergo.
 
It was a warm, sunny morning, and the park was crowded with fashionable loungers. Lady Ostermore left her carriage at the gates, and entered the enclosure on foot, accompanied by Hortensia and followed at a respectful distance by a footman. Her arrival proved something of a sensation. Hats were swept off to her ladyship, sly glances flashed at her companion, who went pale, but , eyes looking straight before her; and there was an obvious of smiles at first, which later grew to be all unconcealed, and, later still, became supplemented by remarks that all might hear, remarks which did not escape—as they were meant not to escape—her ladyship and Mistress Winthrop.
 
“Madam,” murmured the girl, in her agony of shame, “we were not well-advised to come. Will not your ladyship turn back?”
 
Her ladyship displayed a vinegary smile, and looked at her companion over the top of her slowly moving fan. “Why? Is't not pleasant here?” quoth she. “'Twill be more agreeable under the trees yonder. The sun will not reach you there, child.”
 
“'Tis not the sun I mind, madam,” said Hortensia, but received no answer. Perforce she must pace on beside her ladyship.
 
Lord Rotherby came by, arm in arm with his friend, the Duke of Wharton. It was a one-sided friendship. Lord Rotherby was but one of the many of his type who furnished a court, a valetaille, to the gay, dissolute, handsome, duke, who might have been great had he not preferred his to his parts.
 
As they went by, Lord Rotherby bared his head and bowed, as did his companion. Her ladyship smiled upon him, but Hortensia's eyes looked ahead, her face a stone. She heard his grace's insolent laugh as they passed on; she heard his voice—nowise , for he was a man who loved to let the world hear what he might have to say.
 
“! Rotherby, the wind has changed! Your Dulcinea flies with you o' Wednesday, and has ne'er a glance for you o' Saturday! I' faith! ye deserve no better. Art a clumsy to have been overtaken, and the maid's in the right on't to resent your clumsiness.”
 
Rotherby's reply was lost in a splutter of laughter from a group of who had overheard his grace's criticism and were but too ready to laugh at aught his grace might to utter. Her cheeks burned; it was by an effort that she suppressed the tears that anger was forcing to her eyes.
 
The duke, 'twas plain, had set the fashion. Emulators were not wanting. Stray words she caught; by instinct was she conscious of the oglings, the fluttering of fans from the women, the flashing of quizzing-glasses from the men. And everywhere was there a suppressed laugh, a of surprise at her appearance in public—yet not so stifled but that it reached her, as it was intended that it should.
 
In the shadow of a great elm, around which there was a seat, a little group had gathered, of which the centre was the sometime toast of the town and queen of many Wells, the Lady Mary Deller, still beautiful and still unwed—as is so often the way of toasts—but already past her freshness, already leaning upon the support of art to maintain the endowments she had had from nature. She was accounted witty by the witless, and by some others.
 
Of the group that paid its court to her and her companions—two cousins in their first season were Mr. Caryll and his friends, Sir Collis and Mr. Edward Stapleton, the former of whom—he was the lady's brother-in-law—had just presented him. Mr. Caryll was dressed with even more than his ordinary magnificence. He was in dove-colored cloth, his coat very richly laced with gold, his waistcoat—of white brocade with jeweled buttons, the flower-pattern outlined in finest gold thread—descended midway to his knees, whilst the at his wrists and the Steinkirk at his throat were of the finest point. He cut a figure of supremest , as he stood there, his head slightly bowed in as my Lady Mary , his hat tucked under his arm, his right hand outstretched beside him to rest upon the gold head of his clouded- .
 
To the general he was a stranger still in town, and of the sort that draws the eye and provokes . Lady Mary, the only goal of whose shallow existence was the attention of the sterner sex, who loved to break hearts as a child breaks toys, for the fun of seeing how they look when broken—and who, because of that, had succeeded in breaking far fewer than she fondly imagined—looked up into his face with the “most perditiously alluring” eyes in England—so Mr. Craske, the poet, who stood at her elbow now, had described them in the dedicatory of his last book of poems. (Wherefore, in be it observed, she had rewarded him with twenty guineas, as he had calculated that she would.)
 
There was a sudden stir in the group. Mr. Craske had caught sight of Lady Ostermore and Mistress Winthrop, and he fell to giggling, a flimsy handkerchief to his painted lips. “Oh, 'Sbud!” he . “Let me die! The audaciousness of the creature! And me the port and glance of her! Cold as a vestal, let me perish!”
 
Lady Mary turned with the others to look in the direction he was pointing—pointing openly, with no thought of dissembling.
 
Mr. Caryll's eyes fell upon Mistress Winthrop, and his glance was oddly . He observed those matters of which Mr. Craske had seemed to make comment: the stiffness of her carriage, the eyes that looked neither to right nor left, and the pallor of her face. He observed, too, the air with which her ladyship advanced beside her husband's ward, her fan moving languidly, her head nodding to her acquaintance, as in unconcern of the stir her coming had effected.
 
Mr. Caryll had been dull indeed, knowing what he knew, had he not understood to the full the to which Mistress Hortensia was being of purpose set submitted.
 
And just then Rotherby, who had turned, with Wharton and another now, came by them again. This time he halted, and his companions with him, for just a moment, to address his mother. She turned; there was an exchange of greetings, in which Mistress Hortensia as stone—took no part. A silence fell about; quizzing-glasses went up; all eyes were focussed upon the group. Then Rotherby and his friends resumed their way.
 
“The dog!” said Mr. Caryll, between his teeth, but went unheard by any, for in that moment Dorothy Deller—the younger of the Lady Mary's cousins—gave expression to the generous and as yet unsullied little heart that was her own.
 
“Oh, 'tis !” she cried. “Will you not go speak with her, Molly?”
 
The Lady Mary . She looked at the company about her with an apologetic smile. “I beg that ye'll not the child,” said she. “'Tis not that she is without morals—but without knowledge. An innocent little fool; no worse.”
 
“'Tis bad enough, I ,” laughed an old beau, who sought fame as a man of a turn of humor.
 
“But fortunately rare,” said Mr. Caryll dryly. “Like charity, almost unknown in this Babylon.”
 
His tone was not quite nice, although perhaps the Lady Mary was the only one to perceive the note of challenge in it. But Mr. Craske, the poet, diverted attention to himself by a prolonged, . Rotherby was just moving away from his mother at that moment.
 
“They've never a word for each other to-day!” he cried. “Oh, 'Sbud! not so much as the mercy of a glance will the lady afford him.” And he burst into the of King Francis:
 
                “Souvent femme varie,
                 Bien, fol est qui s'y fie!”
 
and laughed his delight at the aptness of his .
 
Mr. Caryll put up his gold-rimmed quizzing-glass, and directed through that powerful weapon of offence an eye of supreme displeasure upon the singer. He could not contain his rage, yet from his languid tone none would have suspected it. “Sir,” said he, “ye've a singular unpleasant voice.”
 
Mr. Craske, thrown out of countenance by so much directness, could only stare; the same did the others, though some few tittered, for Mr. Craske, when all was said, was held in no great by the discriminant.
 
Mr. Caryll lowered his glass. “I've heard it said by the uncharitable that ye were a before ye became a . 'Tis a rumor I shall contradict in future; 'tis plainly a lie, for your voice betrays you to have been a chairman.”
 
“Sir—sir—” spluttered the poetaster, with anger and . “Is this—is this—seemly—between gentlemen?”
 
“Between gentlemen it would not be seemly,” Mr. Caryll agreed.
 
Mr. Craske, quivering, yet controlling himself, bowed stiffly. “I have too much respect for myself—” he .
 
“Ye'll be singular in that, no doubt,” said Mr. Caryll, and turned his shoulder upon him.
 
Again Mr. Craske appeared to make an effort at self-control; again he bowed. “I know—I hope—what is due to the Lady Mary Deller, to—to answer you as—as befits. But you shall hear from me, sir. You shall hear from me.”
 
He bowed a third time—a bow that took in the entire company—and withdrew in high dudgeon and with a great show of dignity. A pause ensued, and then the Lady Mary reproved Mr. Caryll.
 
“Oh, 'twas cruel in you, sir,” she cried. “Poor Mr. Craske! And to him plagiarist! 'Twas the unkindest cut of all!”
 
“Truth, madam, is never kind.”
 
“Oh, fie! You make bad worse!” she cried.
 
“He'll put you in the pillory of his verse for this,” laughed Collis. “Ye'll be most for't.”
 
“Poor Mr. Craske!” sighed the Lady Mary again.
 
“Poor, indeed; but not in the sense to deserve pity. An upstart impostor such as that to soil a lady with his criticism!”
 
Lady Mary's brows went up. “You use a singular severity, sir,” she opined, “and I think it unwise in you to grow so hot in the defence of a reputation whose owner has so little care for it herself.”
 
Mr. Caryll looked at her out of his level gray-green eyes; a hot answer quivered on his tongue, an answer that had crushed her for some time and had probably left him with a quarrel on his hands. Yet his smile, as he considered her, was very sweet, so sweet that her ladyship, guessing nothing of the bitterness it was used to cover, went as near a as it was possible for one so elegant. He was, she judged, another victim ripe for on the altar of her goddessship. And Mr. Caryll, who had taken her measure very , seeing something of how her thoughts were running, bethought him of a sweeter .
 
“Lady Mary,” he cried, a soft reproach in his voice, “I have been sore mistook in you if you are one to be guided by the .” And he waved a hand toward the .
 
She knit her fine brows, bewildered.
 
“Ah!” he cried, interpreting her glance to suit his ends, “perish the thought, indeed! I knew that I could not be wrong. I knew that one so peerless in all else must be peerless, too, in her opinions; judging for herself, and standing firm upon her in of meaner souls— sheep to follow their bell-wether.”
 
She opened her mouth to speak, but said nothing, being too by this sudden and most sweet flattery. Her mere beauty had oft been praised, and in terms that glowed like fire. But what was that compared with this fine of her less obvious mental parts—and that from one who had seen the world?
 
Mr. Caryll was bending over her. “What a chance is here,” he was murmuring, “to mark your lofty detachment—to show how utter is your to what the common may think.”
 
“As—as how?” she asked, blinking up at him.
 
The others stood at gaze, scarce yet suspecting the drift of so much talk.
 
“There is a poor lady yonder, of whose fair name a bubble is being blown and . I dare swear there's not a woman here durst speak to her. Yet what a chance for one that dared! How fine a triumph would be hers!” He sighed. “Heigho! I almost wish I were a woman, that I might make that triumph mine and mark my superiority to these painted dolls that have neither wit nor courage.”
 
The Lady Mary rose, a faint color in her cheeks, a sparkle in her fine eyes. A great joy flashed into Mr. Caryll's in quick response; a joy in her—she thought with ready vanity—and a heightening .
 
“Will you make it yours, as it should be—as it must ever be—to lead and not to follow?” he cried, flattering incredibility trembling in his voice.
 
“And why not, sir?” she demanded, now thoroughly aroused.
 
“Why not, indeed—since you are you?” quoth he. “It is what I had hoped in you, and yet—and yet what I had almost feared to hope.”
 
She frowned upon him now, so excellently had he done his work. “Why should you have feared that?”
 
“Alas! I am a man of little faith—unworthy, indeed, your good opinion since I entertained a doubt. It was a .”
 
She smiled again. “You acknowledge your faults with such a grace,” said she, “that we must needs forgive them. And now to show you how much you need forgiveness. Come, children,” she bade her cousins—for whose she had made apology but a moment back. “Your arm, Harry,” she begged her brother-in-law.
 
Sir Harry obeyed her readily, but without eagerness. In his heart he cursed his friend Caryll for having set her on to this.
 
Mr. Caryll himself hung upon her other side, his eyes toward Lady Ostermore and Hortensia, who, whilst being observed by all, were being approached by few; and these few confined themselves to an exchange of greetings with her ladyship, which constituted a worse offence to Mistress Winthrop than had they stayed away.
 
Suddenly, as if by his gaze, Hortensia's eyes moved at last from their forward fixity. Her glance met Mr. Caryll's across the intervening space. Instantly he swept off his hat, and bowed profoundly. The action drew attention to himself. All eyes were focussed upon him, and between many a pair there was a frown for one who should dare thus to run counter to the general attitude.
 
But there was more to follow. The Lady Mary accepted Mr. Caryll's salutation of Hortensia as a signal. She led the way , and the little band swept forward, straight for its goal, raked by the volleys from a thousand eyes, under which the Lady Mary already began to excitedly.
 
Thus they reached the countess, the countess standing very rigid in her , to receive them.
 
“I hope I see your ladyship well,” said Lady Mary.
 
“I hope your ladyship does,” answered the countess .
 
Mistress Winthrop's eyes were lowered; her cheeks were . Her distress was plain, born of her doubt of the Lady Mary's purpose, and as to what might follow.
 
“I have not the honor of your ward's acquaintance, Lady Ostermore,” said Lady Mary, whilst the men were bowing, and her cousins curtseying to the countess and her companion collectively.
 
The countess gasped, recovered, and eyed the speaker without any sign of affection. “My husband's ward, ma'am,” she corrected, in a voice that seemed to discourage further mention of Hortensia.
 
“'Tis but a distinction,” put in Mr. Caryll suggestively.
 
“Indeed, yes. Will not your ladyship present me?” The countess' eyes turned a moment upon Mr. Caryll, smiling at Lady Mary's elbow. In his face—as well as in the four words he had uttered—she saw that here was work of his, and he gained nothing in her favor by it. Meanwhile there were no grounds—other than such as must have been wantonly offensive to the Lady Mary, and so not to be dreamed of—upon which to refuse her request. The countess herself, and with an ill grace performed the brief ceremony of presentation.
 
Mistress Winthrop looked up an instant, then down again; it was a piteous, almost a pleading glance.
 
Lady Mary, leaving the countess to Sir Harry Stapleton, Caryll and the others, moved to Hortensia's side for a moment she was at loss what to say, and took refuge in a commonplace.
 
“I have long desired the pleasure of your acquaintance,” said she.
 
“I am honored, madam,” replied Hortensia, with downcast eyes. Then lifting them with almost disconcerting suddenness. “Your ladyship has chosen an odd season in which to gratify this desire with which you honor me.”
 
Lady Mary laughed, as much at the remark as for the benefit of those whose eyes were upon her. She knew there would not be wanting many who would her; but these should be far outnumbered by those who would be lost in admiration of her daring, that she could so fly in the face of public opinion; an............