a hurry. And
after all, it really doesn't very much matter _where_ he is!

There had been a whisper or two in the County about her and Lord
Baltimore. Everybody knew the latter had been a little wild since his
estrangement with his wife, but nothing to signify very much--nothing
that one could lay one's finger on, until Lady Swansdown had come down
last year to the Court. Whether Baltimore was in love with her was
uncertain, but all were agreed that she was in love with him. Not that
she made an _esclandre_ of any sort, but _one could see_! And still! she
was such a friend of _Lady_ Baltimore's--an old friend. They had been
girls together--that was what was so wonderful! And Lady Baltimore made
very much of her, and treated her with the kindliest observances,
and----But one had often heard of the serpent that one nourished in
one's bosom only that it might come to life and sting one! The County
grew wise over this complication; and perhaps when Mrs. Monkton had
hinted to Joyce of the "odd people" the Baltimores asked to the Court,
she had had Lady Swansdown in her mind.

"Whose heart?" asks Baltimore, _a propos_ of her last remark. "Yours?"

It is a leading remark, and something in the way it is uttered strikes
unpleasantly on the ears of Dysart. Baltimore is bending over his lovely
guest, and looking at her with an admiration too open to be quite
respectful. But she betrays no resentment. She smiles back at him indeed
in that little slow, seductive way of hers, and makes him an answer in a
tone too low for even those nearest to her to hear. It is a sort of
challenge, a tacit acknowledgment that they two are alone even in the
midst of all these tiresome people.

Baltimore accepts it. Of late he has grown a little reckless. The
battling against circumstances has been too much for him. He has gone
under. The persistent coldness of his wife, her refusal to hear, or
believe in him, has had its effect. A man of a naturally warm and kindly
disposition, thrown thus back upon himself, he has now given a loose
rein to the carelessness that has been a part of his nature since his
mother gave him to the world, and allows himself to swim or go down with
the tide that carries his present life upon its bosom.

Lady Swansdown is lovely and kind. Always with that sense of injury full
upon him, that half-concealed but ever-present desire for revenge upon
the wife who has so coldly condemned and cast him aside, he flings
himself wil