All the way to her friend's house in the morning, she was making resolutions which vanished as soon as they were put to the test. It was only too easy to fall into her old confidential way, to tell all she had seen and heard and felt; to be petted and admired and advised. Also, she could relate many little episodes to Agnes that she had not felt disposed to tell her grandparents, or even Neil--compliments and protestations, and sundry "spats" of envy and jealousy with the ladies of the party. But the conversation settled mainly, however often it diverged, upon Lord Medway. Agnes had often heard her father speak of him. He knew John Wesley, and had asked him to preach at Market-Medway to his tenants and servants; and on the anniversary of the Wesley Chapel in John Street he had given Mr. Bradley twenty pounds toward the Chapel fund. "He is a far finer man than he affects to be," she added, "and father says he wears that drawling, trailing habit like a cloak, to hide his real nature. Do you think he has fallen in love with you, Maria?" "Would it be a very unlikely thing to happen, Agnes? He danced only with me, and when Major Andre arranged the Musical Masque, he consented to sing only on the condition that I sang with him." "And what else, Maria?" "One evening Quentin Macpherson danced the Scotch sword dance--a very clever barbaric thing--but I did not like it; the man looks better at the head of his company. However, he sang a little song called 'The Soldier's Kiss' that was pretty enough. The melody went in this way"--and Maria hummed a strain that sounded like the gallop of horses and shaking of bridles--"I only remember the chorus," she said. "A kiss, Sweet, a kiss, Sweet, For the drums are beat along the street, And we part, and know not when we meet, With another kiss like this, Sweet. "And Lord Medway whispered to me that Shakespeare had said it all far better in one line, _'Touch her soft mouth and march.'_ In Major Andre's masque we had a charming little verse; I brought you a copy of it, see, here it is. The first two lines have a sweet crescendo melody; at the third line there was a fanfare of trumpets in the distance and the gentlemen rattled their swords. The fourth line we sang alone, and at the close Lord Medway bowed to me, and the whole room took up the refrain." Then the girls leaned over the paper, and Agnes read the words aloud slowly, evidently committing them to her memory as she read: "A song of a single note! But it soars and swells above The trumpet's call, and the clash of arms, For the name of the song is Love."