Beaumont began to laugh again. "You would not find her so handsome as
her brother," he said; and it was after this that he attempted to dissuade
the heir of the Duke of Bayswater from accepting Mrs. Westgate's invitation.
"Depend upon it," he said, "that girl means to try for you."

"It seems to me you are doing your best to make a fool of me,"
the modest young nobleman answered.

"She has been asking me," said Beaumont, "all about your people
and your possessions."

"I am sure it is very good of her!" Lord Lambeth rejoined.

"Well, then," observed his companion, "if you go, you go
with your eyes open."

"Damn my eyes!" exclaimed Lord Lambeth. "If one is to be a dozen times
a day at the house, it is a great deal more convenient to sleep there.
I am sick of traveling up and down this beastly avenue."

Since he had determined to go, Percy Beaumont would, of course,
have been very sorry to allow him to go alone; he was a man
of conscience, and he remembered his promise to the duchess.
It was obviously the memory of this promise that made him say
to his companion a couple of days later that he rather wondered
he should be so fond of that girl.

"In the first place, how do you know how fond I am of her?"
asked Lord Lambeth. "And, in the second place, why shouldn't