It is not to be supposed that Lady Alice's tremors communicated themselves to Beatrix. Was it possible to regard that handsome, refined young man, who spoke in that low, sweet voice, and smiled so intelligently, and talked so pleasantly, and with that delicate flavour of romance at times, in the light of a goblin? The gentlemen had made their whist-party. The Rev. Dives Marlowe was chatting to, not with, Lady Jane, who sat listlessly on an ottoman. That elderly girl, Miss Blunket, with the _naïve_ ways, the animated, smiling, and rather malevolent countenance, had secured little Linnett, who bore his imprisonment impatiently and wearily it must be owned. When Miss Blunket was enthusiastic it was all very well; but her playfulness was wicked, and her satire gaily vitriolic. "Mr. Marlowe is fascinated, don't you think?" she inquired of harmless little Linnett, glancing with an arch flash of her fierce eyes at the Rev. Dives. "She's awfully handsome," said Linnett, honestly. "Oh, dear, you wicked creature, you can't think I meant that. She is some kind of cousin, I think--is not she? And her husband has that great living--what's its name?--and no relation in the Church; and Lady Jane, they say, rules him--and Sir Jekyl, some people say, rules her." Linnett returned her arch glance with an honest stare of surprise. "I had no idea of that, egad," said he. "She thinks him so wise in all worldly matters, you know; and people in London fancied she would have been the second Lady Marlowe, if she had not met General Lennox just at a critical time, and fallen in love with him;" and as she said this she laughed. "Really!" exclaimed Linnett; and he surveyed Lady Jane in this new light wonderingly. "I really don't know; I heard it said merely; but very likely, you know, it is not true," she answered with an artless giggle. "I knew you were quizzing--though, by Jove, you did sell me at first; but I really think Sir Jekyl's a little spoony on that pretty little Mrs. Maberly. Is she a widow?" "Oh, dear, no--at least, not quite; she has a husband in India, but then, poor man, he's so little in the way she need hardly wish him dead." "I _see_," said Linnett, looking at Mrs. Maberly with a grave interest. While Miss Blunket was entertaining and instructing little Linnett with this sort of girlish chatter, and from the whist-table, between the deals, arose those critical discussions and reviews, relieved now and then by a joke from the Baronet, or from his partner, Colonel Doocey, at the piano, countenanced by old Lady Blunket, who had come to listen and remained to doze, Beatrix, her fingers still on the keys, was listening to young Strangways. There are times, lights, accidents, under which your handsome young people become incredibly more handsome, and this Guy Strangways now shared in that translated glory, as he leaned on the back of a tall carved chair, sometimes speaking, sometimes listening.