urned towards her.

"My dear!" Milbanke said quickly, "allow me to introduce Mr. David
Barnard! David, this is my--my wife!"

Clodagh looked up curiously, and met the florid face, bland smile, and
observant eyes of Barnard--a man who for nearly a quarter of a century
had managed to prosper in his profession, and at the same time to
retain a prominent place in fashionable society. As their glances met,
she held out her hand.

"How d'you do!" she said. "I believe I've been wanting to know you ever
since I heard you laugh one day two years ago."

She spoke warmly--impulsively--almost as Denis Asshlin might have
spoken. Involuntarily Milbanke glanced at her with a species of
surprise. In that moment she was neither the frank, fearless child he
had first known, nor the self-contained, unfathomable girl who had
since become his daily companion. In the crowded, cosmopolitan
atmosphere of the hotel, she seemed suddenly to display a new
individuality.

Barnard took her outstretched hand, and bowed over it impressively.

"It is very charming of you to say that, Mrs. Milbanke," he murmured.
"But I'm afraid James has told me that you come from Ireland!"

Clodagh laughed.

"He'll also tell you that I lived quite forty miles from the Blarney
stone!"

She looked up, her face brimming with animation. Then suddenly and
involuntarily she coloured. The young Englishman of the terrace was
coming slowly down the stairs.

He descended nonchalantly, and as he reached the hall, he deliberately
paused in front of the little group.

"Hallo, Barney!" he said easily. "Been playing much bridge this
afternoon?"

Barnard looked round with his tactfully affable smile.

"Haven't had one rubber," he said.

"No?"

"No."

There was a pause--a seemingly unnecessary and pointless pause--in
which Barnard looked suavely at the newcomer; the newcomer looked at
Clodagh; and Clodagh looked fixedly out across the hall. Then at last
the older man seemed to realise that something was expected of him.
With a gay gesture, he metaphorically swept the silence aside.

"Mrs. Milbanke," he said affably, "will you permit me to present my
friend Mr. Valentine Serracauld?"

CHAPTER III

Clodagh looked up, colouring afresh; and the young man bowed quickly
and eagerly. He belonged to a type new to her, but familiar to every
social Londoner: the type of young Englishman who, gifted with unusual
height and fine possibilities of muscular develop