"I shouldn't wonder, miss, if you was a titled lady," Mrs. Greenwood said, as the music stopped, and conversation in more subdued tones was possible. Griselda smiled. "No, I have no title of honour," she said. "Ah, well! you _look_ as if you might have, and that's something. I do like to see a genteel air; as I say to Bab and Bell, it's half the battle--it's more than a pretty face. We are come to Bath for Bell's health. She has been so peaky and puling of late. Do you take the waters, miss?" "No," Griselda said. "I am quite well." "Then you came for pleasure?" "Yes," Griselda replied. "Well, I am very proud to have made your acquaintance. We have apartments in the Circus. There's no stint as to money. Mr. Greenwood said--that's the squire, you know--'Go and enjoy yourselves. But I thank my stars I've not to go along with you, that's all.'" At this moment Leslie Travers entered the room, and looking round with the quick glance of love saw Griselda, and Griselda alone. But who were the people she was seated with? Lady Betty called him by name, and stopped giggling behind her fan to do so. "Here, Mr. Travers; go, I beseech you, and rescue Griselda from those Goths, into whose hands she has fallen. What a set! Goodness! it's as fine as a play!" Leslie crossed the room, and bowing before Griselda, said: "Lady Betty would be pleased if you joined her, Miss Mainwaring." Griselda rose, and, bowing to her three companions, walked towards the opposite side of the room. "I knew she was somebody," Mrs. Greenwood exclaimed. "Lady Betty--did you hear? And what a vastly genteel young man!--one of her admirers, no doubt. Well, girls, shall we take a turn? For my part I am getting sleepy;" and a prolonged yawn, which was heard as well as seen, announced the fact to those who were near that Mrs. Greenwood had had enough of the Pump Room for that day. "My dear girl!" Lady Betty exclaimed when Griselda joined her. "Who will you take up with next? Those vulgar folks! Did you ever see anything like the feet of the young one? I declare I'd wear a longer gown if I had such duck's feet!--and the waddle matches--look!" Lady Betty's giggle was a well-known sound in any society she honoured with her presence, and when she could get a companion like the empty-headed Lord Basingstoke, she delighted to sit and "quiz" those whom she thought beneath her in the social scale. "Griselda! She is offended. Look how she is strutting off! He! he! he!" And Lord Basingstoke echoed the laugh in a languid fashion, Lady Betty leaning back and looking up at him with what she thought her most bewitching smile. "I think it is very ill-bred to make remarks on people!" Griselda said, "and very unkind to hurt their feelings, as you must have hurt that lady's." Griselda spoke with some vehemence, which she was apt to do, when her feelings were strongly moved.