Any masquer who saw a woman alone in the crowd, might regard her, charitably, in Captain Fane’s strain, as a lady looking out for adventures. Whether so looking out, or innocent of such an intention, the mere fact of her having foolishly exposed herself, constituted her good game for the buffoonery of the masquerade. Yet Lady Bell’s trepidation did not amount to panic, and she assured herself that it was silly, for she had simply to take off her mask, and show that she was Lady Bell Trevor, in order to find friends, and be freed from molestation. Any woman who had ever sustained a serious misadventure at a masquerade, like most women who sustained misadventures in a wider sphere—the world, had only been too willing to undergo the infliction, or had yielded to a private reason for risking it, and either way had themselves to thank for their humiliation. But Lady Bell was certainly unwilling to plead helplessness, crave pity, and virtually acknowledge that her natural dignity did not stand her in good stead. Moreover, the acknowledgment ought not to be required of her; for already some who knew her, as she was convinced, though it was their present cue to conceal their knowledge, were there. Sir George Waring and Colonel Selby, the first as Sir Roger de Coverley, the second as the Lord Chancellor of England, had come up with her, holding some of her cards in their hands. Lady Bell was tired, shaken. She could think of no other resource than that of flying from her persecutors with as much speed as she could command, or the crowd would allow. While she hurried along she held down her head, and tried not to listen to besieging addresses, suggesting in her attitude something of the aspect of Ferdinand seeking vainly to shake off Ariel’s tricksy sprites; notwithstanding that Lady Bell’s foes were of more solid substance. The group arrested the attention of a domino, who at once made for it, catching up by chance as he did so one of the fortune-teller’s cards which dropped from a gentleman’s hand. While he joined in the pursuit, which was attracting notice, he heard bets laid on the race that caused his blood to boil, little as bets meant at a time when men wagered on drops running down a window-pane, on an old woman’s hobbling, or on the hours that a sick man might live. The prize might be nothing to Captain Fane, for it was possibly a case of mistaken identity where he was concerned; and even if he were in the right, he was ignorant and jealous of Lady Bell’s reason for keeping herself hidden from him, as it seemed. It might very well be that she would resent his interference. He could not help remembering, though she had sought to atone for it, how she had treated his opposition at the water-party. He might reap no thanks, only anger and disgust as the result of his officiousness. But for her sake he would venture all.