you, and you seem to have succeeded.
You admit you challenged him to kiss you----"

"He had no right to take what I said to Tony as a challenge, although I
confess I said it to tantalise him."

"Humph! If I were your age, as beautiful and attractive as you, and I
had dared a man to kiss me, I should feel slighted, to say the least of
it, and regard him as a poltroon, if he failed to take up my
challenge," commented Lady Fermanagh drily. "You can't mean to say you
did not expect Don Carlos to carry out the threat or promise he made in
his note, particularly as you made no protest against his having
entered your bedroom?"

"I--er--I don't know what I expected," answered Myra, rather weakly.
"I mean, I did not intend to give him the opportunity to carry out his
threat. And I thought it best to say nothing about the note, because I
was afraid to risk a scandal, and I was somehow afraid that Don Carlos
would turn the tables on me. Now I have a good mind to tell Tony, and
to tell him what happened to-day, and leave him to deal with Don
Carlos."

"Do, by all means, my dear--if you want to make shipwreck of your
life," retorted Lady Fermanagh, sardonically. "Tony will be flattered
to find you were playing him off against Don Carlos at Auchinleven.
And perhaps not! He may decide, on reflection, that a girl who makes
love to another man, or, if you prefer it, encourages another man to
make love to her, during her engagement and in the house of her fiance,
might do something of the same sort after marriage in the house of her
husband."

"Tony wouldn't be such a beast," exclaimed Myra. "If he dared to blame
me, I'd break off my engagement and marry Don Carlos, if only to spite
him."

"Humph! And supposing, after breaking off your engagement, you found
that Don Carlos did not want to marry you, what a fool you'd look and
feel!" responded her aunt. "My dear Myra, don't you realise that if
the facts were known the world would condemn you for attempting to play
fast and loose with both Tony Standish and Don Carlos de Ruiz, and the
general verdict would be that it served you right to be left in the
lurch. Tony would be quite justified in throwing you over, and by the
time the gossips had finished your reputation would be--well, rather
the worse for wear."

"Aunt Clarissa, you don't really think Tony would throw me over if he
knew?" asked Myra anxiously, after a thoughtful pause. "Why, I told
Tony at Auchinleven that