"Becky Sharpe!" Aynesworth murmured.

Lovell nodded.

"Perhaps," he admitted, "only Ruth was a lady. To go on with my story.
A hunting coterie, as you fellows know, means lots of liberty, and a
general free-and-easiness amongst the sexes, which naturally leads to
flirtations more or less serious. Ruth's little affairs were either
too cleverly arranged, or too harmless for gossip. Amongst the other
women of the hunt, she seemed outwardly almost demure. But one
day--there was a row!"

Lovell paused, and took a drink from a glass by his side.

"I hope you fellows won't think that I'm spinning this out," he said.
"It is, after all, in itself only a commonplace story, but I've
carried it locked up in my memory for years, and now that I've let it
loose, it unwinds itself slowly. This is how the row came about.
Lumley one afternoon missed Wingrave and Ruth from the hunting field.
Someone most unfortunately happened to tell him that they had left the
run together, and had been seen riding together towards White Lodge,
which was the name of the house where these two young men lived.
Lumley followed them. He rode into the stable yard, and found there
Ruth's mare and Wingrave's covert hack, from which he had not changed
when they had left the field. Both animals had evidently been ridden
hard, and there was something ominous in the smile with which the head
groom told him that Lady Ruth and Wingrave were in the house.

"The two men had separate dens. Wingrave's was much the better