e
channel and then into another, as she pleased; and all to the flattery
and glorification of the talker. The famous Minister had come to visit
Lady Henry, as he had done for many Sundays in many years; but it was
not Lady Henry, but her companion, to whom his homage of the afternoon
was paid, who gave him his moment of enjoyment--the moment that would
bring him there again. Lady Henry's fault, no doubt; but Wilfrid Bury,
uneasily aware every now and then of the dumb tumult that was raging in
the breast of the haughty being beside him, felt the pathos of this slow
discrowning, and was inclined, once more, rather to be sorry for the
older woman than to admire the younger.

At last Lady Henry could bear it no longer.

"Mademoiselle, be so good as to return his father's letters to Captain
Warkworth," she said, abruptly, in her coldest voice, just as Montresor,
dropping his--head thrown back and knees crossed--was about to pour into
the ears of his companion the whole confidential history of his
appointment to office three years before.

Julie Le Breton rose at once. She went towards a table at the farther
end of the large room, and Captain Warkworth followed her. Montresor,
perhaps repenting himself a little, returned to Lady Henry; and though
she received him with great coolness, the circle round her, now
augmented by Dr. Meredith, and another politician or two, was
reconstituted; and presently, with a conscious effort, visible at least
to Bury, she exerted herself to hold it, and succeeded.

Suddenly--just as Bury had finished a very neat analysis of the Shah's
public and private character, and while the applauding laughter of the
group of intimates amid which he sat told him that his epigrams had been
good--he happened to raise his eyes towards the distant settee where
Julie Le Breton was sitting.

His smile stiffened on his lips. Like an icy wave, a swift and tragic
impression swept through him. He turned away, ashamed of having seen,
and hid himself, as it were, with relief, in the clamor of amusement
awakened by his own remarks.

What had he seen? Merely, or mainly, a woman's face. Young Warkworth
stood beside the sofa, on which sat Lady Henry's companion, his hands in
his pockets, his handsome head bent towards her. They had been talking
earnestly, wholly forgetting and apparently forgotten by the rest of the
room. On his side there was an air of embarrassment. He seemed to be
choosing his words with difficul