glad--enchanted--to have her! I don't care about that, but what I _do_
want is"--the Duchess looked up with calm audacity--"that you should
find her a house."

The Duke paused in his walk and surveyed his wife with amazement.

"Evelyn, are you _quite_ mad?"

"Not in the least. You have more houses than you know what to do with,
and a _great_ deal more money than anybody in the world ought to have.
If they ever do set up the guillotine at Hyde Park Corner, we shall be
among the first--we ought to be!"

"What is the good of talking nonsense like this, Evelyn?" said the Duke,
once more consulting his watch. "Let's go back to the subject of my
letter to Lady Henry."

"It's most excellent sense!" cried the Duchess, springing up. "You
_have_ more houses than you know what to do with; and you have one house
in particular--that little place at the back of Cureton Street where
Cousin Mary Leicester lived so long--which is in your hands still, I
know, for you told me so last week--which is vacant and
furnished--Cousin Mary left you the furniture, as if we hadn't got
enough!--and it would be the _very_ thing for Julie, if only you'd lend
it to her till she can turn round."

The Duchess was now standing up, confronting her lord, her hands
grasping the chair behind her, her small form alive with eagerness and
the feminine determination to get her own way, by fair means or foul.

"Cureton Street!" said the Duke, almost at the end of his tether. "And
how do you propose that this young woman is to live--in Cureton Street,
or anywhere else?"

"She means to write," said the Duchess, shortly. "Dr. Meredith has
promised her work."

"Sheer lunacy! In six months time you'd have to step in and pay all her
bills."

"I should like to see anybody dare to propose to Julie to pay her
bills!" cried the Duchess, with scorn. "You see, the great pity is,
Freddie, that you don't know anything at all about her. But that
house--wasn't it made out of a stable? It has got six rooms, I
know--three bedrooms up-stairs, and two sitting-rooms and a kitchen
below. With one good maid and a boy Julie could be perfectly
comfortable. She would earn four hundred pounds--Dr. Meredith has
promised her--she has one hundred pounds a year of her own. She would
pay no rent, of course. She would have just enough to live on, poor,
dear thing! And she would be able to gather her old friends
round her when she wanted them. A cup of tea and her delightful
convers