the driver. As the vehicle drew away, one
caught a glimpse of a crest upon the panel.

Two women entered the auction room.

II

THE PRINCESS SOFIA

These ladies were young, neither much older than Lanyard, both were very
much alive, openly betraying an infatuation with existence very like his
own, and both were lovely enough to excuse the exquisite insolence of their
young vitality.

As is frequently the case in such associations, since a pretty woman seldom
courts comparison with another of her own colouring, one was dark, the
other fair.

With the first, Lanyard was, like all London, on terms of visual
acquaintance. The reigning beauty of the hour, her portrait was enjoying a
vogue of its own in the public prints. Furthermore, Lady Diantha Mainwaring
was moderately the talk of the town, in those prim, remotely ante-bellum
days--thanks to high spirits and a whimsical tendency to flout the late
Victorian proprieties; something which, however, had yet to lead her into
any prank perilous to her good repute.

The other, a girl whose hair of golden bronze was well set off by Russian
sables, Lanyard did not know at all; but he knew at sight that she was far
too charming a creature to be neglected if ever opportunity offered to be
presented to her. And though the first article of his creed proscribed
women of such disastrous attractions as deadly dangerous to his kind, he
chose without hesitation to forget all that, and at once began to cudgel
his wits for a way to scrape acquaintance with the companion of Lady
Diantha.

Their arrival created an interesting bustle, a buzz of comment, a craning
of necks--flattery accepted by the young women with ostensible unconcern, a
cliche of their caste. As they had entered in a humour keyed to the highest
pitch of gaiety consistent with good breeding, so with more half-stifled
laughter they settled into chairs well apart from all others but, as it
happened, in a direct line between Lanyard and the man whose repellent cast
of countenance had first taken his interest.

Thus it was that Lanyard, after eyeing the young women unobserved as long
as he liked, lifted his glance to discover upon that face a look that
amazed him.

It wasn't too much to say (he thought) that the man was transfigured by
malevolence, so that he blazed with it, so that hatred fairly flowed, an
invisible yet manifest current of poisoned fire, between him and the girl
with the hair of burnished bronze