s."

"And I a Cabinet Minister!" Sir Leslie declared. "Miss Clara, let us have
that walk."

"To-morrow night," she promised. "When I get up it will be to go to bed.
Even your love-making, Sir Leslie, could not keep me awake to-night."

The Duchess rose. The dust was gone, but she was pale, and looked tired.

"Let us leave these men to make plans for us," she said. "I hope we shall
see something of you to-morrow, Mr. Mannering. Good-night, everybody."

Mannering rose and bowed with the others. For a moment their eyes met.
Not a muscle of her face changed, and yet Mannering was conscious of a
sudden wave of emotion. He understood that she had not forgotten!

CHAPTER II

THE SNUB FOR BORROWDEAN

Berenice sat at one of the small round tables in the courtyard, finishing
her morning coffee. Sir Leslie sat upon the steps by her side. It was one
of those brilliant mornings in early September, when the sunlight seems
to find its way everywhere. Even here, surrounded by the pile of worn
grey stone buildings, which threw shadows everywhere, it had penetrated.
A long shaft of soft, warm light stretched across the cobbles to their
feet. Berenice, slim and elegant, fresh as the morning itself, glanced up
at her companion with a smile.

"Clara," she remarked, "does not like to be kept waiting."

"She is not down yet," he answered, "and there is something I want to say
to you."

Her delicate eyebrows were a trifle uplifted.

"Do you think that you had better?" she asked.

"I am a man," he said, "and things are known to me which a woman would
scarcely discover. Do you think that it is quite fair to send Lady
Redford out motoring with Mrs. Mannering?"

"Why not?"

"Lady Redford is, of course, ignorant of Mrs. Mannering's antecedents.
What you may do yourself concerns no one. You make your own social laws,
and you have a right to. But I do not think that even you have a right to
pass Blanche Phillimore on to your friends, even under the shelter of
Mannering's name."

Berenice looked at him for several seconds without speaking. Borrowdean
bit his lip.

"If we were not acquaintances of long standing, Sir Leslie," she said,
calmly, "I should consider your remarks impertinent. As it is, I choose
to look upon them as a regrettable mistake. The person, whoever she may
be, whom the Duchess of Lenchester chooses to receive is usually
acceptable to her friends. I beg that you will not refer to the subject
again."

S