These are two little words that carry more meaning in them than all the long, grandiose phrases in the Queen’s English. These two little words, indefinite as they seem, show exactly what a man’s mind is when it oscillates ’twixt right and wrong. Zai is undeniably charming, but she is not--_la Blonde aux yeux noir_! She lacks the power to inflame the heart of the million. Her soft, dove-like eyes, cannot burn into men’s brains and souls like the dangerous but glorious black ones of Marguerite Ange! “What piece did you see last night, Delaval?” It is a poser. For one moment Lord Delaval, with the impatience and dislike of being catechised, which is natural to him, has a mind to speak the truth, and tell his wife that this morning he is not up to small talk. But he thinks better of it, and is equal to the occasion. “A piece called _La Tentation_, darling! A thing in which there was a lot of love-making and smiling and bowing, and a woman, supposed to be an angel--but probably she is a devil,” he adds, almost _sotto voce_. “Was she pretty?” “Tol lol! You can’t tell what an actress is like on the stage, you know!” “I hope you won’t find out what she is like off the stage!” Zai says earnestly. “Actresses are such bad, dangerous women, sometimes!” “And how about _actors_?” The shot goes home, for she flinches and flushes a little, and he is rather sorry he has said this. It was snobbish, perhaps! But when a man wishes to stop his wife’s mouth, he must do it the best way he can. Zai will not pursue the subject of Theatres and Thespians after his cut, he thinks. But he is wrong. She flushed more from a wounded feeling at his manner and tone than from the reference to her old lover, for whom she has the most profound indifference now. “Have you heard anything about Trixy, Delaval?” she asks, in a low, humble voice. She is very much ashamed of this sister of hers, and scarcely likes mentioning her name before the man she not only loves but honours. “Yes. Stubbs has got a divorce. Poor old chap! It appears that he was awfully cut up; had a fit, and nearly died. He wanted her to go back to him, and promised never to breathe a word of recrimination; but when he found she wouldn’t, he got a divorce, and gave that scoundrel Conway a bill at six months for ten thousand pounds provided he married her! Of course, the money was too much for the fellow; so the marriage will come off by-and-by.” “And where is Trixy now?” “Living at Hammersmith; dining at Richmond and the Orleans with all the fast men; dressing to the nine, and making herself the talk of town. She has quite forgotten the word more familiar to her youth than her Bible--_convenances_; but what can be expected? If a girl is innately bad, no power on earth can keep her straight.” “But Trixy was not innately bad,” Zai murmurs, deprecatingly. “She married a man she could not love, and then--she yielded to----”