am sure I will never deserve by any action of mine."

Was ever wayward woman so unjust? For weeks Churchill had been deluging
her with ardent letters, to which she had not deigned to answer one
word. Now she assumes an air of injured innocence, and accuses _him_ of
unkindness! She even promises to see him, but cannot resist the
temptation to qualify the concession with a gibe.

"That would hinder you," she says, with delicious, if
cruel satire, "from seeing the play, which I fear would
be a great affliction to you, and increase the pain in
your head, which would be out of anybody's power to ease
until the next new play. Therefore, pray consider; and,
without any compliment to me, send me word if you can
come to me without any prejudice to your health."

At any rate, the Sphinx had spoken and shown that she had some feeling,
if only that of pique and unreason; and the despairing lover was able to
take a little heart. After all, coquetry, even if carried to the verge
of cruelty, holds more promise than Arctic coldness.

But the course of love, which could scarcely be said to have even begun,
was not to run at all smoothly. Sir Winston Churchill had set his heart
on his son marrying a gilded bride, and he had discovered the very woman
for his ambitious purpose--one Catherine Sedley, daughter of his old
friend Sir Charles Sedley, a lady, no longer quite young, angular and
unattractive, but heiress to much gold and many broad acres. And he lost
no time in impressing on his handsome boy the necessity of such an
alliance. Pretty maids-of-honour were all very well to practise
love-making on; but land and money-bags far outlast and outshine