"the memory is sacred. Believe me,
very sacred."

She fell apparently once again to weeping bitterly.

"The memory is always sacred--with men," observed Portsmouth, for the
benefit of her guests, not excepting the Irish youth. "Nay, tell us the
name of the fair one who left you so young. My heart goes out to you,
dear Beau."

"Kind hostess," replied Nell, assuming her tenderest tones, "the name of
my departed self is--Nell!"

Hart caught the word. The player was standing near, reflecting on the
scene and on the honeyed words of the Duke of Buckingham, who was
preparing the way that he might use him.

"Nell!" he muttered. "Who spoke that name?"

The hostess too was startled.

"Nell!" she exclaimed, with contending emotions. "Strange! Another
cavalier who graces _mon bal masque_ to-night has lost a loved one
whose name is Nell. Ah, but she was unworthy of his noble love."

She spoke pointedly at the masked King, who started perceptibly.

"Yes," he thought; for his conscience smote him, "unworthy--he of her."

"Unworthy, truly, if he dances so soon and his own Nell dead," added
Nell, reflectively, but so that all might hear, more especially Charles.

"Perchance Nell too thinks so," thought he, as he restlessly walked
away, sighing: "I wish I were with her on the terrace."

"'Sdeath, Duchess," continued Nell abruptly, in assumed horror at the
sudden thought, "the lady's spirit may visit the ball, to the confusion
of us all. Such things have been."

"The Nell I mean," said Portsmouth, with a confident smile, "will not
venture here, e'en in spirit."

Nell assumed a baby-innocence of face.

"She has not been bidden, I presume?" she queried.

"The vixen would not stop for asking," declared Portsmouth, almost
fiercely.

"Come without asking?" cried Nell, as if she could not believe that
there could be such people upon the earth. "How ill-bred! Thine ear,
loved one. My Nell revisits the world again at midnight. The
rendezvous--St. James's Park."

Hart brushed close enough to the group, in his biting curiosity, to
catch her half-whisper to Portsmouth. He at once sought a window and
fresh air, chafing with surprise and indignation at what he had
overheard.

"St. James's at midnight," he muttered. "'Tis my Nell's abode."

The Duchess herself stood stunned at what appeared to her a possible
revelation of great import.

"St. James's!" she thought. "Can he mean Madame Gwyn? No, no!"

The look of suspicion w