something more than tolerance, and even Carrissima Faversham, in spite
of a manifestly unfavourable bias, strove to hold the balance even. It
was her brother Lawrence who took the most adverse view; insisting that
Miss Rosser was neither more nor less than an adventuress--"a pretty
woman on the make" was his expression, uttered, it is true, before he
had an opportunity of seeing her face.

Her entrance on the scene was heralded by Mark Driver one evening
towards the end of March, when he had accepted an invitation to dine
with his sister and Lawrence in Charteris Street, S.W.

Carrissima's maid found her so exacting that evening, that she might
have been going to an important party, instead of merely to a quiet
dinner with her brother and his wife; but then, expecting Mark to make
a fourth, she wished to look her very best, and flattered herself she
had succeeded.

Although she sometimes longed for the power to add a few inches to her
stature, she realized that she had already much to be thankful for.
Suppose, for example, that her eyebrows had been as fair as her hair,
or even worse, her eyelashes, which as it happened were satisfactorily
black.

Mr. Lawrence Faversham, barrister-at-law, was thirty-two years of age,
and rather short, although he always held his head in the air as if he
were doing his best to appear taller. Hearing the street door bell
ring, Mrs. Lawrence Faversham waylaid Carrissima on the stairs and
insisted on taking her to gaze at little Victor, aged two, peacefully
sleeping in the nursery.