use
moor in Argyleshire which the two young men talked about as belonging to
some unnamed friend of the Earl's, which they had thought of shooting
over before the grouse season was ended.

'Lord Hartfield has property in Argyleshire,' said the dowager, when
they talked of these shootings. 'Do you know his estate, Mr. Hammond?'

'Hammond knows that there is such a place, I daresay,' replied
Maulevrier, replying for his friend.

'But you do not know Lord Hartfield, perhaps,' said her ladyship, not
arrogantly, but still in a tone which implied her conviction that John
Hammond would not be hand-in-glove with earls, in Scotland or elsewhere.

'Oh, yes! I know him by sight every one in Argyleshire knows him by
sight.'

'Naturally. A young man in his position must be widely known. Is he
popular?'

'Fairly so.'

'His father and I were friends many years ago,' said Lady Maulevrier,
with a faint sigh. 'Have you ever heard if he resembles his father?'

'I believe not. I am told he is like his mother's family.'

'Then he ought to be handsome. Lady Florence Ilmington was a famous
beauty.'

They were sitting in the drawing-room after dinner, the room dimly
lighted by darkly-shaded lamps, the windows wide open to the summer sky
and moonlit lake. In that subdued light Lady Maulevrier looked a woman
in the prime of life. The classical modelling of her features and the
delicacy of her complexion were unimpaired by time, while those traces
of thought and care which gave age to her face in the broad light of day
were invisible at night. John Hammond contemplated that refined and
placid countenance with profound admiration. He remembered how her
ladyship's grandson had compared her with the Sphinx; and it seemed to
him to-night, as be studied her proud and tranquil beauty, that there
was indeed something of the mysterious, the unreadable in that
countenance, and that beneath its heroic calm there might be the ashes
of tragic passion, the traces of a life-long struggle with fate. That
such a woman, so beautiful, so gifted, so well fitted to shine and
govern in the great world, should have been content to live a long life
of absolute seclusion in this remote valley was in itself a social
mystery which must needs set an observant young man wondering. It was
all very well to say that Lady Maulevrier loved a country life, that she
had made Fellside her earthly Paradise, and had no desire beyond it. The
fact remained that it was not