you
watch her, and see whether she's made for poverty. She takes to luxury
as a fish to water. What would she be if she left me? A little visiting
teacher, perhaps, in a Bloomsbury lodging. That's not her line at all."

"But somebody else might employ her as you do?" Sir Wilfrid had
suggested.

"You forget I should be asked for a character," said Lady Henry. "Oh, I
admit there are possibilities--on her side. That silly goose, Evelyn
Crowborough, would have taken her in, but I had a few words with
Crowborough, and he put his foot down. He told his wife he didn't want
an intriguing foreigner to live with them. No; for the present we are
chained to each other. I can't get rid of her, and she doesn't want to
get rid of me. Of course, things might become intolerable for either of
us. But at present self-interest on both sides keeps us going. Oh, don't
tell me the thing is odious! I know it. Every day she stays in the house
I become a more abominable old woman."

A more exacting one, certainly. Sir Wilfrid thought with pity and
amusement of the commissions with which Mademoiselle Julie had been
loaded. "She earns her money, any way," he thought. "Those things will
take her a hard afternoon's work. But, bless my soul!"--he paused in his
walk--"what about that engagement to Duchess Evelyn that I heard her
make? Not a word, by-the-way, to Lady Henry about it! Oh, this
is amusing!"

He went meditatively on his way, and presently turned into his club to
write some letters. But at five o'clock he emerged, and told a hansom to
drive him to Grosvenor Square. He alighted at the great red-brick
mansion of the Crowboroughs, and asked for the Duchess. The magnificent
person presiding over the hall, an old family retainer, remembered him,
and made no difficulty about admitting him.

"Anybody with her grace?" he inquired, as the man handed him over to the
footman who was to usher him up-stairs.

"Only Miss Le Breton and Mr. Delafield, Sir Wilfrid. Her grace told me
to say 'not at home' this afternoon, but I am sure, sir, she will
see you."

Sir Wilfrid smiled.

As he entered the outer drawing-room, the Duchess and the group
surrounding her did not immediately perceive the footman nor himself,
and he had a few moments in which to take in a charming scene.

A baby girl in a white satin gown down to her heels, and a white satin
cap, lace-edged and tied under her chin, was holding out her tiny skirt
with one hand and dancing befor