the comfortably gossiping tone one knows so well, drawing her chair a
little nearer to the fire. "I can't think what could have tempted him to
do it."

Portia turns abruptly toward her.

"Do you, too, question his innocence?" she says, her breath coming
quickly.

"Well--er--you see one doesn't like to talk about it," says Mrs.
Beaufort with a faint yawn. "It seems pleasanter to look upon him as a
suffering angel, but there are some who don't believe in him you know.
Do come closer to the fire, Portia, and let us have a good chat."

"Go on," says Portia, "you were talking of Fabian, you were saying--"

"Yes, just so. Was I uncharitable? It doesn't make him a bit the worse
in my eyes, you know, not a bit. It is all done and over years ago, and
why remember nasty things. Really, do you know, Portia--it may be horrid
of me--but really I think the whole story only makes him a degree more
interesting."

Portia shivers, and ignores this suggestion.

"Do other people doubt him, too?" she asks in a strangely cold tone.
Though she may disbelieve in him herself, yet it is agony to her that
others should do the same.

"My dear, yes, of course; a great many; in fact, pretty nearly everybody
but just those you see here--Sir Mark excepted, I think, and then Dicky
Browne. But Dicky hasn't enough brains to believe or disbelieve in
anybody."

"Ah!" says Portia. She leans back in her chair, and holds up a fan
between her and the fire and Julia. She can hardly analyze her own
thoughts; but, even at this moment, when all her finest feelings are
ajar, she tells herself that surely--surely she cordially detests Julia
Beaufort. She tells herself, too, that she loves Mark Gore.

"You see, in your doubt of him, you are not a solitary exception," says
Julia, with elephantine playfulness. "Others think with you. It is the
plainest case in the world, I think. I don't blame you."

"How do you know I _do_ doubt him?" asks Portia, suddenly, turning her
large eyes upon her, that are glittering in the firelight. At this Julia
recoils a little and looks somewhat uncomfortable.

"Your voice, your manner, led me to believe so," she says, slowly, and
with hesitation. "If you don't, of course it is so much to your credit."

"You mean--" asks Portia.

"Well, his whole bearing would preclude the thought of dishonor of any
kind," says Julia, boldly, and with the utmost effrontery, considering
all she had said a moment since. "Suspicion could h