Delafield was walking through the Park towards Victoria Gate. A pair of beautiful roans pulled up suddenly beside him, and a little figure with a waving hand bent to him from a carriage.

"Jacob, where are you off to? Let me give you a lift?"

The gentleman addressed took off his hat.

"Much obliged to you, but I want some exercise. I say, where did Freddie get that pair?"

"I don\'t know, he doesn\'t tell me. Jacob, you must get in. I want to speak to you."

Rather unwillingly, Delafield obeyed, and away they sped.

"J\'ai un tas de choses à vous dire," she said, speaking low, and in French, so as to protect herself from the servants in front. "Jacob, I\'m very unhappy about Julie."

Delafield frowned uncomfortably.

"Why? Hadn\'t you better leave her alone?"

"Oh, of course, I know you think me a chatterbox. I don\'t care. You must let me tell you some fresh news about her. It isn\'t gossip, and you and I are her best friends. Oh, Freddie\'s so disagreeable about her. Jacob, you\'ve got to help and advise a little. Now, do listen. It\'s your duty--your downright catechism duty."

And she poured into his reluctant ear the tale which Miss Emily Lawrence nearly a fortnight before had confided to her.

"Of course," she wound up, "you\'ll say it\'s only what we knew or guessed long ago. But you see, Jacob, we didn\'t know. It might have been just gossip. And then, besides"--she frowned and dropped her voice till it was only just audible--"this horrid man hadn\'t made our Julie so--so conspicuous, and Lady Henry hadn\'t turned out such a toad--and, altogether, Jacob, I\'m dreadfully worried."

"Don\'t be," said Jacob, dryly.

"And what a creature!" cried the Duchess, unheeding. "They say that poor Moffatt child will soon have fretted herself ill, if the guardians don\'t give way about the two years."

"What two years?"

"The two years that she must wait--till she is twenty-one. Oh, Jacob, you know that!" exclaimed the Duchess, impatient with him. "I\'ve told you scores of times."

"I\'m not in the least interested in Miss Moffatt\'s affairs."

"But you ought to be, for they concern Julie," cried the Duchess. "Can\'t you imagine what kind of things people are saying? Lady Henry has spread it about that it was all to see him she bribed the Bruton Street servants to let her give the Wednesday party as usual--that she had been flirting with him abominably for months, and using Lady Henry\'s name in the most impertinent ways. And now, suddenly, everybody seems to know something about this Indian engagement. You may imagine it doesn\'t look very well for our poor Julie. The other night at Chatton House I was furious. I made Julie go. I wanted her to show herself, and keep up her friends. Well, it was horrid! One or two old frights, who used to be only too thankful to Julie for reminding Lady Henry to invite them, put their noses in the air and behaved odiously. And even some of the nicer ones seemed changed--I could see Julie felt it."

"Nothing of all that will do her any real harm," said Jacob, rather contemptuously.

"Well, no. I know, of course, that her real friends will never forsake her--never, never! But, Jacob"--the Duchess hesitated, her charming little face furrowed with thought--"if only so much of it weren\'t true. She herself--"

"Please, Evelyn," said Delafield, with decision, "don\'t tell me anything she may have said to you."

The Duchess flushed.

"I shouldn\'t have betrayed any confidence," she said, proudly. "And I must consult with some one who cares about her. Dr. Meredith lunched with me to-day, and he said a few words to me afterwards. He\'s quite anxious, too--and unhappy. Captain Warkworth\'s always there--always! Even I have been hardly able to see her the last few days. Last Sunday they took the little lame child and went into the country for the whole day--"

"Well, what is there to object to in that?" cried Jacob.

"I didn\'t say there was anything to object to," said the Duchess, looking at him with eyes half angry, half perplexed. "Only it\'s so unlike her. She had promised to be at home that afternoon for several old friends, and they found her flown, without a word. And think how sweet Julie is always about such things--what delicious notes she writes, how she hates to put anybody out or disappoint them! And now, not a word of excuse to anybody. And she looks so ill--so white, so fixed--like a person in a dream which she can\'t shake off. I\'m just miserable about her. And I hate, hate that man--engaged to her own cousin all the time!" cried the little Duchess, under her breath, as she passionately tore some violets at her waist to pieces and flung them out of the carriage. Then she turned to Jacob.

"But, of course, if you don\'t care twopence about all this, Jacob, it\'s no good talking to you!"

Her taunt fell quite unnoticed. Jacob turned to her with smiling composure.

"You have forgotten, my dear Evelyn, all this time, that Warkworth goes away--to mid-Africa--in little more than two weeks."

"I wish it was two minutes," said the Duchess, fuming.

Delafield made no reply for a while. He seemed to be studying the effect of a pale shaft of sunlight which had just come stealing down through layers of thin gray cloud to dance upon the Serpentine. Presently, as they left the Serpentine behind them, he turned to his companion with more apparent sympathy.

"We can\'t do anything, Evelyn, and we\'ve no right whatever to talk of alarm, or anxiety--to talk of it, mind! It\'s--it\'s disloyal. Forgive me," he added, hastily, "I know you don\'t gossip. But it fills me with rage that other people should be doing it."

The brusquerie of his manner disconcerted the little lady beside him. She recovered herself, however, and said, with a touch of sarcasm, tempered by a rather trembling lip:

"Your rage won\'t prevent their gossiping, Mr. Jacob, I thought, perhaps, your friendship might have done something to stop it--to--to influence Julie," she added, uncertainly.

"My friendship, as you call it, is of no use whatever," he said, obstinately. "Warkworth will go away, and if you and others do their best to protect Miss Le Breton, talk will soon die out. Behave as if you had never heard the man\'s name before--stare the people down. Why, good Heavens! you have a thousand arts! But, of course, if the little flame is to be blown into a blaze by a score of so-called friends--"

He shrugged his shoulders.

The Duchess did not take his rebukes kindly, not having, in truth, deserved them.

"You are rude and unkind, Jacob," she said, almost with the tears in her eyes. "And you don\'t understand--it is because I myself am so anxious--"

"For that reason, play the part with all your might," he said, unyieldingly. "Really, even you and I oughtn\'t to talk of it any more. But there is one thing I want very much to know about Miss Le Breton."

He bent towards her, smiling, though in truth he was disgusted with himself, vexed with her, and out of tune with all the world.

The Duchess made a little face.

"All very well, but after such a lecture as you have indulged in, I think I prefer not to say any more about Julie."

"Do. I\'m ashamed of myself--except that I don\'t retract one word, not one. Be kind, all the same, and tell me--if you know--has she spoken to Lord Lackington?"

The Duchess still frowned, but a few more apologetic expressions on his part restored a temper that had always a natural tendency to peace. Indeed, Jacob\'s boutades never went long unpardoned. An only child herself, he, her first cousin, had played the part of brother in her life, since the days when she first tottered in long frocks, and he had never played it in any mincing fashion. His words were often blunt. She smarted and forgave--much more quickly than she forgave her husband. But then, with him, she was in love.

So she presently vouchsafed to give Jacob the news that Lord Lackington at last knew the secret--that he had behaved well--had shown much feeling, in fact--so that poor Julie--

But Jacob again cut short the sentimentalisms, the little touching phrases in which the woman delighted.

"What is he going to do for her?" he said, impatiently. "Will he make any provision for her? Is there any way by which she can live in his house--take care of him?"

The Duchess shook her head.

"At seventy-five one can\'t begin to explain a thing as big as that. Julie perfectly understands, and doesn\'t wish it."

"But as to money?" persisted Jacob.

"Julie says nothing about money. How odd you are, Jacob! I thought that was the last thing needful in your eyes."

Jacob did not reply. If he had, he would probably have said that what was harmful or useless for men might be needful for women--for the weakness of women. But he kept silence, while the vague intensity of the eyes, the pursed and twisted mouth, showed that his mind was full of thoughts.

Suddenly he perceived that the carriage was nearing Victoria Gate. He called to the coachman to stop, and jumped out.

"Good-bye, Evelyn. Don\'t bear me malice. You\'re a good friend," he said in her ear--"a real good friend. But don\'t let people talk to you--not even elderly ladies with the best intentions. I tell you it will be a fight, and one of the best weapons is"--he touched his lips significantly, smiled at her, and was gone.

The Duchess passed out of the Park. Delafield turned as though in the direction of the Marble Arch, but as soon as the carriage was out of sight he paused and quickly retraced his steps towards Kensington Gardens. Here, in this third week of March, some of the thorns and lilacs were already in leaf. The grass was springing, and the chatter of many sparrows filled the air. Faint patches of sun flecked the ground between the trees, and blue hazes, already redeemed from the dreariness of winter, filled the dim planes of distance and mingled with the low, silvery clouds. He found a quiet spot, remote from nursery-maids and children, and there he wandered to and fro, indefinitely, his hands behind his back. All the anxieties for which he had scolded his cousin possessed him, only sharpened tenfold; he was in torture, and he was helpless.

However, when at last he emerged from his solitude, and took a hansom to the Chudleigh estate office in Spring Gardens, he resolutely shook off the thoughts which had been weighing upon him. He took his usual interest in his work, and did it with his usual capacity.

Towards five o\'clock in the afternoon, Delafield found himself in Cureton Street. As he turned down Heribert Street he saw a cab in front of him. It stopped at Miss Le Breton\'s door, and Warkworth jumped out. The door was quickly opened to him, and he went in without having turned his eyes towards the man at the far corner of the street.

Delafield paused irresolute. Finally he walked back to his club in Piccadilly, where he dawdled over the newspapers till nearly seven.

Then he once more betook himself to Heribert Street.

"Is Miss Le Breton at home?"

Thérèse looked at him with a sudden flickering of her clear eyes.

"I think so, sir," she said, with soft hesitation, and she slowly led him across the hall.

The drawing-room door opened. Major Warkworth emerged.

"Ah, how do you do?" he said, shortly, staring in a kind of bewilderment as he saw Delafield. Then he hurriedly looked for his hat, ran down the stairs, and was gone.

"Announce me, please," said Delafield, peremptorily, to the little girl. "Tell Miss Le Breton that I am here." And he drew back from the open door of the drawing-room. Thérèse slipped in, and reappeared.

"Please to walk in, sir," she said, in her shy, low voice, and Delafield entered. From the hall he had caught one involuntary glimpse of Julie, standing stiff and straight in the middle of the room, her hands clasped to her breast--a figure in pain. When he went in, she was in her usual seat by the fire, with her embroidery frame in front of her.

"May I come in? It is rather late."

"Oh, by all means! Do you bring me any news of Evelyn? I haven\'t seen her for three days."

He seated himself beside her. It was hard, indeed, for him to hide all signs of the tumult within. But he held a firm grip upon himself.

"I saw Evelyn this afternoon. She complained that you had had no time for her lately."

Julie bent over her work. He saw that her fingers were so unsteady that she could hardly make them obey her.

"There has been a great deal to do, even in this little house. Evelyn forgets; she has an army of servants; we have only our hands and our time."

She looked up, smiling. He made no reply, and the smile died from her face, suddenly, as though some one had blown out a light............