tell
me, dear,' said May, in her warm, affectionate way, 'do you really like
him--you know what I mean?'

May's eyes and voice were so full of significance that to pretend to
misunderstand was impossible.

'I like Mr. Harding well enough. It is very pleasant to have him to talk
to. I am sure I don't want to run down my own sex--there are plenty
only too anxious to do that--but I am afraid that there is not a girl in
Dublin who thinks of anything except how she is to get married.'

'I don't know about that,' said May, a little offended. 'I suppose if
you think of a man at all, you think of how he likes you.'

The defiant tone in which these words were spoken was surprising; and,
for a moment, Alice stood staring blankly at this superb cream-fleshed
girl, superb in her dress of cream faille, her sensual beauty poetized
by the long veils which hung like gossamer-webs from the coils of her
copper-gleaming hair.

'I am afraid, May,' she said, 'that you think a great deal too much of
such things. I don't say anything against Mr. Scully, but I think it
right to tell you that he is considered a very dangerous young man; and
I am sure it does a girl no good to be seen with him. It was he who . . .'

'Now I'll not hear you abuse Fred,' cried May. 'We are great friends; I
like you better than any other girl, and if you value our friendship,
you'll not speak to me again like this. I wouldn't put up with it, no,
not from my own mother.'

The girl moved towards the door hastily, but Alice laid her hand on her
arm, saying:

'You mustn't be angry, May; perhaps you're right; I shouldn't meddle in
things that don't concern me; but then we have been so long friends that
I couldn't help--'

'I know, I know,' the girl answered, overcome as it were by an
atmosphere. 'You were speaking only for my good; but if you're friends
with a person, you can't stand by and hear them abused. I know people
speak badly of Fred; but then people are so jealous--and they are all
jealous of Fred.'

The girls examined each other's dresses, and at the end of a long
silence May said:

'What an extraordinary thing this Drawing-Room is when one comes to
think of it. Just fancy going to all this expense to be kissed by the
Lord-Lieutenant--a man one never saw before. Will you feel ashamed when
he kisses you?'

'Well, I don't know that I have thought much about it,' said Alice,
laughing. 'I suppose it doesn't matter, it is only a ceremony, not a
rea