syphon, and afterwards holding a glass in my hand.

"Do you mind my saying what I think of Lady Blantock and her
daughter?" inquired Molly, with the meek sweetness of a coaxing
child. "Perhaps I oughtn't, but it would be a relief to my feelings."

"I wonder if it would to mine?" I remarked impersonally, addressing
the ancient tapestry on an opposite wall.

"Let's try, and see," persisted Molly. "Calculating Cats! There, it's
out. I wouldn't have eaten their old dinner, except to please you.
I've known them only thirteen days, but I could have said the same
thing when I'd known them thirteen minutes. Indeed, I'm not sure I
didn't say it to Jack. Did I, or did I not. Lightning Conductor?"

"You did," replied the person addressed, answering with a smile to the
name which he had earned in playing the part of Molly Randolph's
chauffeur, in the making of their love story.

"Women always know things about each other--the sort of things the
others don't want them to know," Molly went on; "but there's no use in
our warning men who think they are in love with Calculating Cats,
because they would be certain we were jealous. Of course I shouldn't
say this to you, Lord Lane, if you hadn't taken me into your
confidence a little--that night of my first London ball."

"It was the night I proposed to Nell," I said, half to myself.

"Sir Horace Jerveyson was at the ball, too."