s heroic"--Ruth paused on the reminiscence with a smile--"
and, if you will believe me, quite waspish when I told her so."

"You should have refused to come. You might have known that I was
drunk, or I could never have sent."

"How does it go?" She stood before him, puckering her brows a little as
she searched to remember the words--"'_On the seventh day, when the
heart of the king was merry with wine, he commanded the seven
chamberlains_--'"

"Spare me."

"'--_to bring Vasbti the queen before the king with the crown royal, to
show the people and the princes her beauty, for she was fair to look
on_.' Do I quote immodestly, my lord?"

"Not immodestly," he answered. "For I think--I'll be sworn--no woman
ever had half your beauty without knowing it. But you quote
_mal a propos_. Queen Vashti refused to come."

"'_Therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him_.'"

"I think, again, that you were not the woman to obey any such fear."

"No. Queen Vashti refused to come, being a queen. Whereas I, my lord--

"'Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire?'"

"My slave?" he asked. "Setting aside last night--when I was
disgustingly drunk--have you a single excuse for using that word?"

"Of your giving, none. You have been more than considerate. Of my own
choosing, yes."

He stared.

"At any rate Tatty is not your slave," she went on, and he smiled with
her. "I am glad you asked Tatty's pardon. Did she forgive you
easily?"

"Too easily. She was aware, she said, that gentlemen would be
gentlemen."

"She must have meant precisely the reverse."

"Was I pretty bad?"

She put a hand across her eyes as if to brush the image from them.
"What matters the degree? It was another man seated and wearing my
lord's body. _That_ hurt."

"By God, Ruth, it shall never happen again!"

She winced as he spoke her name, and her colour rose. "Please make no
promise in haste," she said.

"Excuse me; when a man takes an oath for life, the quicker he's through
with it the better--at least that's the way with us Vyells.
It's trifles--like getting drunk, for instance--we do deliberately.
Believe me, child, I have a will of my own."

"Yes," she meditated, "I believe you have a strong will."

"'Tis a swinish business, over-drinking, when all's said and done."
He announced it as if he made a discovery; and indeed something of a
discovery it was, for