At seven o'clock Miss Mallison's carriage was announced, and Teresa exhibited a dutiful daughter's unwillingness "to keep the horse waiting." In the great hall she slid her arms into a Burberry coat, pulled a knitted cap over her head, and passing out of the porch sprang lightly to the front seat of a shabby dog-cart. The coachman, shabby to match, stood at the horse's head, and as Peignton took his place, looked on with an impenetrability which denoted that this was not the first time he had been superseded. Then he in his turn climbed to a back seat, and the horse trotted off down the dark avenue. Teresa had looked forward with keenest anticipation to this moment when she and Dane would sit quietly together in the friendly dark. There was no expectation of love-making in her mind, far less of a formal declaration; she was content just to sit by his side, and leaning back in her seat be able to gaze her fill at the strong, dark form. On a previous occasion he had given her the reins to hold while he lit a cigarette, and the picture of his face illumined by the tiny flame of the match would remain for life in her mental gallery. She hoped he would light a cigarette to-night. If the inchoate thoughts of the girl's mind could have been translated into words at that moment, they would have made a poem, but Teresa had not the gift of expression. She asked herself several times what she should "talk about," before at last she broke the silence. "You see it _did_ pay to discard from strength!" Peignton laughed. The point had been disputed between the two times and again, but he felt an amused admiration of the manner in which the girl held to her point. To-night his remembrance of the game was hazy, but Teresa as the victor was entitled to complaisance. "You played rattling well. You always do. I never knew a woman less miserly of trumps. Do you know Lady Cassandra well?" "I--think so!" Doubt lingered in Teresa's voice. "They ask me fairly often. She's very kind. Of course, we're not--intimate. She's so much older."