"So very kind of you to come, Lionel," said the Duchess, pressing his hand cordially. "I know how busy you are with your parishioners." "You are one of them," smiled the clergyman. "At odd moments, certainly; but we globe-trot for our places of worship nowadays. Sit down"; she indicated a convenient chair opposite her own. "Now tell me the news of your small world. Is Joan quite well?" "Could not be better, considering the circumstances." "I am so glad; when do you expect the happy event?" "In a month, please God." Leah looked pensively into the fire. "I hope it will be a boy." "I shall be more than content with a girl. Why a boy particularly?" "Why not, when an heir is so important? You succeed Jim, and a new Marquis of Frith----" "My dear Duchess, you and the Duke are young. There is little chance of my succeeding. I may be congratulating you some day." "No," cried Leah, almost fiercely; "such a thing can never be, thank God." Lionel stared. "Why 'thank God'?" "Oh--er--I hardly know; of course, I should hate to be pestered with children. The nursery is an obsolete institution here, and will remain so, unless"--she hesitated--"unless Jim marries again." "Duchess!" "Why not Leah?" "If it will please you. But why talk of Jim's marrying again, when you are in the best of health and spirits?" She shrugged indifferently. "One never knows, I might go first." "I sincerely trust not." "Does that imply that you wish me to be a real widow, after posing as a sham one?" "Of course not; but you talk so strangely." "And so honestly. Remember, I have always paid you the compliment of being plain even to rudeness." Lionel tried to read her face, but in vain, and could not arrive at the meaning of her apparently aimless conversation. The slanting rays of sunset made a radiant glory round her as she half sat, half reclined in the chair, and her beauty could bear even that merciless test. Youth, health, money, charm, loveliness--with these desirable blessings at her command, what else could she want? "I do not quite understand," said the perplexed man. "Understand what?" she asked absently; then became more alive to his question. "Oh, my chatter. You will, before we part. I am no sphinx to propose riddles." "Every woman is a sphinx." "Without a secret; that is why you men find us so difficult to comprehend." "I confess to the difficulty at this moment." "What a complex mind I must have! Yet I am a very ordinary butterfly of fashion; something with wings, at all events, though not entirely an angel." Her visitor laughed. "Am I to pay you a compliment, or rebuke you for frivolity?" "You can do both or either; the sweet first will counterbalance the bitter last. But I sicken of compliments." "Even when genuine?"