ike best, the town or the
country?"

"Whichever I'm not in, I think."

"Ah, just so. Whichever you are not in at present. That is because you
are still idle. You have not settled yourself!" At this reference to the
possibility of Lady Ongar settling herself, Captain Clavering pricked up
his ears, and listened eagerly for what might come next. He only knew of
one way in which a young woman without a husband could settle herself.
"You must wait, my dear, a little longer, just a little longer, till the
time of your trouble has passed by."

"Don't talk such nonsense, Sophie," said the countess.

"Ah, my dear, it is no nonsense. I am always telling her, Captain
Clavering, that she must go through this black, troublesome time as
quick as she can; and then nobody will enjoy the town so much as de rich
and beautiful Lady Ongar. Is it not so, Captain Clavering?"

Archie thought that the time had now come for him to say something
pretty, so that his love might begin to know that he was there. "By
George, yes, there'll be nobody so much admired when she comes out
again. There never was anybody so much admired before--before--that is,
when you were Julia Brabazon, you know; and I shouldn't wonder if you
didn't come out quite as strong as ever."

"As strong!" said the Franco-Pole. "A woman that has been married is
always more admired than a meess."

"Sophie, might I ask you and Captain Clavering to be a little less
personal?"

"There is noting I hate so much as your meeses," continued Madam
Gordeloup; "noting! Your English meesses give themselves such airs. Now
in Paris, or in dear Vienna, or in St. Petersburg, they are not like
that at all. There they are nobodies--they are nobodies; but then they
will be something very soon, which is to be better. Your English meess
is so much and so grand; she never can be greater and grander. So when
she is a mamma, she lives down in the country by herself, and looks
after de pills and de powders. I don't like that. I don't like that at
all. No; if my husband had put me into the country to look after de
pills and de powders, he should have had them all, all--himself, when he
came to see me." As she said this with great energy, she opened her eyes
wide, and looked full into Archie's face.

Captain Clavering, who was sitting with his hat in his two hands between
his knees, stared at the little foreigner. He had heard before of women
poisoning their husbands, but never had heard a woman