“That is better,” remarked the lady, surveying with satisfaction the new-curled lock. “The country dance? For that Mr. Lightfoot hath my promise.” “It seems that I am a laggard,” said Haward. The knocker sounded below. “I am at home, Chloe,” announced the mistress; and the slave, laying aside her work, slipped from the room. Haward played with the trifles upon the dressing table. “Wherein have I offended, Evelyn?” he asked, at last. The lady arched her brows, and the action made her for the moment very like her handsome father. “Why, there is no offense!” she cried. “An old acquaintance, a family friend! I step a minuet with Mr. Lee; I stand up for a country dance with Mr. Lightfoot; I wear pink instead of blue, and have lost my liking for white roses,--what is there in all this that needs such a question? Ah, you have broken my silver chain!” “I am clumsy to-day!” he exclaimed. “A thousand pardons!” He let the broken toy slip from his fingers to the polished surface of the table, and forgot that it was there. “Since Colonel Byrd (I am sorry to learn) keeps his room with a fit of the gout, may I--an old acquaintance, a family friend--conduct you to the Palace to-night?” The fan waved on. “Thank you, but I go in our coach, and need no escort.” The lady yawned, very delicately, behind her slender fingers; then dropped the fan, and spoke with animation: “Ah, here is Mr. Lee! In a good hour, sir! I saw the bracelet that you mended for Mistress Winston. Canst do as much for my poor chain here? See! it and this silver heart have parted company.” Mr. Lee kissed her hand, and took snuff with Mr. Haward; then, after an ardent speech crammed with references to Vulcan and Venus, chains that were not slight, hearts that were of softer substance, sat down beside this kind and dazzling vision, and applied his clever fingers to the problem in hand. He was a personable young gentleman, who had studied at Oxford, and who, proudly conscious that his tragedy of Artaxerxes, then reposing in the escritoire at home, much outmerited Haward’s talked-of comedy, felt no diffidence in the company of the elder fine gentleman. He rattled on of this and that, and Evelyn listened kindly, with only the curve of her cheek visible to the family friend. The silver heart was restored to its chain; the lady smiled her thanks; the enamored youth hitched his chair some inches nearer the fair whom he had obliged, and, with his hand upon his heart, entered the realm of high-flown speech. The gay curtains waved; the roses were sweet; black Chloe sewed and sewed; the hairdresser’s hands wove in and out, as though he were a wizard making passes.