in the
keyhole. The blue eyes of the lady were meanwhile sounding his, but he
only smiled and said:--

"Then it seems it IS peculiar?"

When the conversation became more general he had time to observe other
features of the lady than her placid eyes. Her light hair was very long,
and grew low down the base of her neck. Her mouth was firm, the upper
lip slightly compressed in a thin red line, but the lower one, although
equally precise at the corners, became fuller in the centre and turned
over like a scarlet leaf, or, as it struck him suddenly, like the
tell-tale drop of blood on the mouth of a vampire. Yet she was
very composed, practical, and decorous, and as the talk grew more
animated--and in the vicinity of Mrs. MacSpadden, more audacious--she
kept a smiling reserve of expression,--which did not, however, prevent
her from following that lively lady, whom she evidently knew, with a
kind of encouraging attention.

"Kate is in full fling to-night," she said to the hostess. Lady
Macquoich smiled ambiguously--so ambiguously that the consul thought it
necessary to interfere for his friend. "She seems to say what most of
us think, but I am afraid very few of us could voice as innocently," he
smilingly suggested.

"She is a great friend of yours," returned the lady, looking at him
through her half-veiled lids. "She has made us quite envy her."

"And I am afraid made it impossible for ME to either sufficiently thank
her or justify her taste," he said quietly. Yet he was vexed at an
unaccountable resentment which had taken possession of him--who but a
few hours before had only laughed at the porter's criticism.

After the ladies had risen, the consul with an instinct of sympathy was
moving up towards "Jock" MacSpadden, who sat nearer the host, when he
was stopped midway of the table by the dignitary who had sat opposite
to Mrs. MacSpadden. "Your frien' is maist amusing wi' her audacious
tongue--ay, and her audacious ways," he said with large official
patronage; "and we've enjoyed her here immensely, but I hae mae doots
if mae Leddy Macquoich taks as kindly to them. You and I--men of the
wurrld, I may say--we understand them for a' their worth; ay!--ma wife
too, with whom I observed ye speakin'--is maist tolerant of her, but
man! it's extraordinar'"--he lowered his voice slightly--"that yon
husband of hers does na' check her freedoms with Kilcraithie. I wadna'
say anythin' was wrong, ye ken, but is he no' over confiden