ht of concealing her liking. The result was that Soame Rivers began
to think it quite on the cards that, if nothing should interpose, he
might marry Helena Langley--and that, too, before very long. Then he
should have in every way his heart's desire.

If nothing should interpose? Yes, but there was where the danger came
in! If nothing should interpose? But was it likely that nothing and
nobody would interpose? The girl was well known to be a rich heiress;
she was the only child of a most distinguished statesman; she would be
very likely to have Dukes and Marquises competing for her hand, and
where might Soame Rivers be then? The young man sometimes thought that,
if through her unconventional and somewhat romantic nature he could
entangle her in a love affair, he might be able to induce her to get
secretly married to him--before any of the possible Dukes and Marquises
had time to put in a claim. But, of course, there would be always the
danger of his turning Sir Rupert hopelessly against him by any trick of
that kind, and he saw no use in having the daughter on his side if he
could not also have the father. Besides, he had a sore conviction that
the girl would not do anything to displease her father. So he gave up
the idea of the romantic elopement, or the secret marriage, and he
reminded himself that, after all, Helena Langley, with all her
unconventional ways, was not exactly another Lydia Languish.

Then the Dictator and Hamilton came on the scene, and Rivers had many an
unhappy hour of it. At first he was more alarmed about Hamilton than
about the Dictator. He could easily understand an impulsive girl's
hero-worship for the Dictator, and he did not think much about it. The
Dictator, he assured himself, must seem quite an elderly sort of person
to a girl of Helena's age; but Hamilton was young and handsome, of good
family, and undoubtedly rich. Hamilton and Helena fraternised very
freely and openly in their adoration for Ericson, and Rivers thought
moodily that that partnership of admiration for a third person might
very well end in a partnership of still closer admiration for each
other. So, although from the very first he disliked the Dictator, yet he
soon began to detest Hamilton a great deal more.

His dislike of Ericson was not exclusively and altogether because of
Helena's hero-worship. According to his way of thinking, all foreign
adventure had something more or less vulgar in it, but that was
especially obje