y well standing. I do hope Jimmy Sands will sing his
little bit of solo correctly; I shall feel quite nervous till it is
over."

Lord Reggie looked at her with earnest pleasure, and even with a
momentary affection. He had never liked her so much before.

"Don't any of you stare at him while he is singing," he said, "or he
will get sharp. He always does; I have noticed it."

"What a pity staring does not have that effect upon all of us," said
Madame Valtesi. "London would be quite brilliant. I have looked at
people for hours, but they have never got sharp."

"There goes the five minutes' bell," said Lady Locke; "we are just in
time."

When they reached the churchyard Lord Reggie and Tommy went round to the
vestry, and the rest of the party made their way to a front pew, amid
the suppressed excitement of the rest of the congregation. Mr. Amarinth
especially created a sensation; but he always expected to do that. Ever
since he had made a name for himself by declaring that he was pleased
with the Equator, and desired its further acquaintance, he had been
talked about. Whenever the public interest in him showed signs of
flagging he wrote an improper story, or published an epigram in one
volume, on hand-made paper, with immense margins, or produced a play
full of other people's wit, or said something scandalous about the North
Pole. He had ruined the reputation of more than one eminently
respectable ocean which had previously been received everywhere, and had
covered Nature with confusion by his open attacks upon her. Just now he
was living upon his green carnation, which had been freely paragraphed
in all the papers; and when that went out of vogue he had some intention
of producing a revised version of the Bible, with all the inartistic
passages cut out, and a rhymed dedication to Mr. Stead, whose _Review
of Reviews_ always struck him as only a degree less comic than the
books of that arch-humorist Miss Edna Lyall, or the bedroom imaginings
of Miss Olive Schreiner. The villagers of Chenecote gaped open-mouthed
at his green carnation and crimped hair; and the exhortation as
delivered in a _presto_ mumble by Mr. Smith was received with general
apathy, as the opera of "Faust" is received on an off night in the opera
season.

Lord Reggie and Tommy were completely hidden behind the curtain that
shielded the organ seat; but the presence and agitation of the former
were indicated by the confused perambulations of Jimmie San