"With Miss Hunsden, perhaps--certainly not with me. Come, Mr.
Grosvenor."

It was the first spiteful shaft Lady Louise had ever condescended to
launch, and she bit her lip angrily an instant after, as George whirled
her away.

"Idiot that I am," she thought, "to show him I can stoop to be
piqued--to show him I can be jealous--to show him I care for him like
this! He will get to fancy I love him next, and he--he has had neither
eyes nor ears for any one else since he saw Harrie Hunsden this
morning."

A sharp, quick pain pierced the proud breast of the earl's daughter,
for she did love him, and she knew it--as much as it was in her
lymphatic nature to love at all.

"I will never forgive him--never!" her white teeth clinched. "The
dastard--to play the devoted to me, and then desert me at the first
sight of a madcap on horseback. I will never stoop to say one civil
word to him again."

Lady Louise kept her vow. Sir Everard, penitent and remorseful, strove
to make his peace in vain.

Lord Carteret's daughter listened icily, sent barbed shafts tipped with
poison from her tongue in reply, danced with him once, and steadily
refused to dance again.