"Oh, I don't know; a lot of them were together. Captain Foster, and John Cust, and Lord Deerham, and Booby Charteris, and others. It seems Charley was a little overcome the previous evening. He and his brother had been dining with the Guards, very freely, and afterwards they went to--I forget the place--somewhere that young men go to of an evening, and Charley finished himself up with brandy and cigars; and then he managed to hiccup out, that the only angel living upon earth was Lady Adela Grubb." "And that's all!" she said lightly--"that Charley called me an angel! I told him it was a mare's-nest." "No; it is not all," quickly answered Lady Grace. "It might be all, if it were not for your folly. I have seen Charley hold your hand in his; I have seen him kiss it; I have seen him bend forward and whisper to you until his hair has all but touched yours. It is very bad, Adela." "It is very amusing; it serves to pass away the time," laughed Adela. "And, pray, Grace, how came you to know so much of what they say and do at their clubs?" "That's one of the annoying parts of it. Colonel Hope heard it; he was present. He went home, shocked and scared, to tell Sarah; and Sarah came yesterday morning and told mamma." "Shocked and scared too? I should like to have seen Sarah's long face!" "You should have seen mamma's. No wonder she went down to your husband. But that is not all yet, Adela. One of them, I think it was Lord Deerham--whoever it was, had dined here a night or two before--told the others that you flirted with Charley desperately before your husband's eyes, and that while you showed favour to one you snubbed the other." "And it's true," coolly avowed Adela. "I like Charley Cleveland, and I _choose_ to flirt with him. But if you strait-coated people think I have any wrong liking for him, you err woefully. Grace, all this is but idle talk. I shall never compromise myself by so much as a hazardous word, for Charley, or for any one else. I have just told him so." "Pleasant! the necessity for such an assertion to one's lord and master!" "I never loved any one in my life; and I'm sure I am not going to begin now. Not even Captain Stanley--though I did have a passing liking for him. Perhaps you will be surprised to hear, Grace, that there were odd moments in my life during the first year or two after my marriage, when I was nearer loving Francis Grubb than I had been of loving any one--only that I had set out by steeling my heart against him." Grace gazed at her sister wonderingly. "But that's all past: and of love I feel none for any mortal man, and don't mean to feel it. But I like amusement--and I am amusing myself with Charley Cleveland." "You have no right to do it, Adela. What is but sport to you, as it seems, may be death to him."