ng christened, vaccinated and confirmed,
Constance had not also been "presented" at the proper moment. However
Constance probably enjoyed the evening of the Court ball more than any
other in the week, since she went to the Italian Embassy after dinner to
help her girl friend, the daughter of Italy's new Prime Minister, Elisa
Bardinelli, to dress for the function; and the two girls were so
enchanted to see each other, and had so much Roman gossip to get
through, that Donna Elisa was scandalously late, and the Ambassador
almost missed the Royal Procession.

But that had been the only spot of pleasure in Connie's fortnight. Lady
Langmoor was puzzled by her pale looks and her evident lack of zest for
the amusements offered her. She could only suppose that her niece was
tired out with the balls of Commem., and Connie accepted the excuse
gratefully. In reality she cared for nothing day after day but the
little notes she got from Sorell night and morning giving her news of
Radowitz. Till now he had been too ill to see her. But at last the
doctor had given leave for a visit, and as soon as Lady Langmoor had
gone off on her usual afternoon round of concerts and teas, Connie moved
to the window, and waited for Sorell.

How long was it since she had first set foot in England and Oxford?
Barely two months! And to Constance it seemed as if these months had
been merely an unconscious preparation for this state of oppression and
distress in which she found herself. Radowitz in his misery and
pain--Falloden on the Cherwell path, defending himself by those
passionate retorts upon her of which she could not but admit the partial
justice--by these images she was perpetually haunted. Certainly she had
no reason to look back with pleasure or self-approval on her Oxford
experiences. In all her dealings with Falloden she had behaved with a
reckless folly of which she was now quite conscious; courting risks; in
love with excitement rather than with the man; and careless whither the
affair might lead, so long as it gratified her own romantic curiosities
as to the power of woman over the masculine mind.

Then, suddenly, all this had become serious. She was like the playing
child on whose hand the wasp sat down. But in this case the moral sting
of what had happened was abidingly sharp and painful. The tragedy of
Radowitz, together with the charm interwoven with all her few
recollections of him, had developed in Connie feelings of unbearable
pi