ecause God so wills it.
We tremble when we see the apostates cast aside their rank and descend
into the world's arena, for we fear that the people, finding them at
close view only human, may come at last to believe that the right by
which we rule is not, after all, divine. Then they will tear down the
barrier of caste, strip us of the privileges of rank, and proclaim the
absurdity that all men are equal. And I might add, we are jealous of the
exceptions, because they are happy. Marriages of state are seldom love
matches; the kind which furnish the incentives are always so."

To all of which Susie had listened with bated breath, only glancing up
once or twice to study her companion's face. It was a lifting of the
curtain, a revelation of the heart, which left her deeply moved.

"You don't seem to care for the tradition," she said, at last.

"Oh, yes, I do; it would be untrue to pretend otherwise. Only, it has
occurred to me quite recently that merely to inherit a position is not
quite enough. A man should try to deserve it"

"And you're going to try?" asked Susie, looking at him with something
very like adoration in her eyes.

"I am going to try--yes," he answered. "But I shall need help--I am
afraid I should not make a success of it by myself."

And then he fell silent, for they had reached the end of the promenade,
where the others joined them.

CHAPTER XVII

The Duchess to the Rescue

It may be that Lord Vernon had been so fortunate as to find a topic of
conversation equally absorbing; at any rate, Nell entered the hotel with
her sister rather subdued and tremulous, and they mounted to their rooms
in silence. A week before, they would probably have thrown themselves
into each other's arms and kissed each other and cuddled each other and
cried over each other, without precisely knowing why, or, at least,
without troubling to put the reason into words. But the events of the
past few days had, imperceptibly, wrought a change in their relations.
An impalpable veil had come between them, a subtle dissonance in point
of view. They were pledged, as it were, to rival interests.

A woman who has no other confidante will, invariably, seek counsel and
sympathy of her own reflected self; and if so it was in this case, for
each of our two heroines went straight to her room, and locked the door,
and sat down before her glass, and, chin in hands, communed long and
earnestly with the image pictured there, gazing de