score of times; and the wonder is that he has kept out of it. No, thank
you, my ladies; I am not a marrying man."

"Why do you tell me this?" asked Lady Maude, a sick faintness stealing
over her face and heart.

"You are one of ourselves, and I tell you anything. It will be fun for
you, Maude, if you'll open your eyes and look on. There are some in the
house now who--" He stopped and laughed.

"I would rather not hear this!" she cried passionately. "Don't tell me."

Lord Hartledon looked at her, begged her pardon, and quitted the room
with his cigar. Lady Maude, black as night, dashed her pencil on to the
cardboard, and scored her sketch all over with ugly black lines. Her face
itself looked ugly then.

"Why did he say this to me?" she asked of her fevered heart. "Was it said
with a purpose? Has he found out that I _love_ him? that my shallow old
mother is one of the subtlest of the anglers? and that--"

"What on earth are you at with your drawing, Maude?"

"Oh, I have grown sick of the sketch. I am not in a drawing mood to-day,
mamma."

"And how fierce you were looking," pursued the countess-dowager, who had
darted in at rather an inopportune moment for Maude--darting in on people
at such moments being her habit. "And that was the sketch Hartledon asked
you to do for him from the old painting!"