They sat down, Sir Harry being his host's partner. Now, Sir Harry was, and felt himself to be, in high favor, owing to his sound views on the question of the day, and he was thinking of anything in the world rather than the fall of the cards. Consequently his play was marked by somewhat more than its ordinary atrociousness, and the Colonel grew redder and redder as every scheme he cherished was nipped in the bud by his partner's blunders. Tora and Philip held all the cards, and their good fortune covered Tora's deficiency in skill, and made Philip's sound game seem a brilliant one. At last the Colonel could bear it no longer. He broke up the party, and challenged Philip to a game of piquet. "At any rate, one hasn't a partner at piquet," he said. Sir Harry smiled, and followed Tora to the drawing room. With such rewards for bad play, who would play well? He sat down by her and watched her making spills. Presently he began to make spills too. Tora looked at him. Sir Harry made a very bad spill indeed, and held it up with a sigh. "That's the sort of thing," he said, "I have to light my pipe with at home!" "As you've been very good to-night," answered Tora, "I'll give you some of mine to take with you. Let me show you how to do them for yourself." Then ensued trivialities which bear happening better than they do recording--glances and touches and affectations of stupidity on one side and impatience on the other--till love's ushers, their part fulfilled, stand by to let their master speak, and the hidden seriousness, which made the trifles not trifling, leaps to sudden light. Before her lover's eager rush of words, his glorifying of her, his self-depreciation, Tora was defenseless, her raillery was gone, and she murmured nothing but: "You're _not_ stupid--you're _not_ dull. Oh, how can you!"