“I don’t know where he is. Fighting for Italy, I suppose. He was bound to end by doing that, though, of course, he’s by way of being a tremendous Clerical. In with the Black Nobility at Venice, you see.” “Nobility, indeed! A scamp like that!” Now she had no particular reason for enmity against Valdez; rather the contrary. But Waldo had, and she reflected Waldo, just as I thought that Waldo’s flavor of bitterness towards Lucinda reflected her quality of mind, the sharp edge of her temper. “How do you account for what she did?” she asked me, with a touch of irritation and restlessness. “‘Account for it!’ Love is unaccountable, isn’t it?” I remembered that Lucinda had used the words about herself. “Doesn’t her mother ever hear from her?” “I don’t know. I’m not in touch with that excellent woman. She has, I fancy, vanished from the ken of Cragsfoot as completely as her daughter.” “I expect they’ve just gone under, that pair—Lucinda and Arsenio. Because they were just a pair, weren’t they?” I seemed to hear an echo of Waldo’s “like to like.” Or more probably Waldo’s “like to like” was an echo of what I now heard. “Oh, I don’t see why they should have. We may very likely knock up against them some day,” I remarked with a laugh. It was still light enough for me to see a flash in her eyes as she turned quickly on me. “If you think I’m——” she exclaimed impetuously; but she pulled herself up, and ended with a scornful little laugh. But of course she had not pulled herself up in time; I knew that she had been going to say “afraid,” and she knew that I knew it. Lucinda had avowed a feeling that it was not all over between herself and Nina yet. Something of a similar feeling seemed to find a place in Lady Dundrannan’s mind; she contemplated the possibility of another round in the fight—and she was not afraid of it. Or was she? Just a little—in her heart? I did not think that she need be, seeing the sort of man that Waldo was, knowing (as I now knew) Lucinda’s mind; knowing too, alas, Lucinda’s fate. But it was curious to find the same foreboding—if one could call it that—in both women. “I really don’t see why you should think any more about Lucinda,” I said. “I don’t think I need,” she agreed, with a smile that was happy, proud, and confident. I looked her in the face, and laughed. She stopped, and held out her hand to me. As I took it she went on. “Yes, Waldo is telling the old people down there, and I’ll tell you here. We’re engaged, Julius; Waldo asked me this afternoon, and I said yes.” “I hope you will believe that I congratulate you and him very sincerely, and, if I may, gladly welcome you into the family.” “Without any _arrière-pensée_?” Her challenge was gay and good-humored. “Absolutely! Why do you suspect anything else?” “Well then, because you are—or were—fond of Lucinda.” “Oh, you’ve got it out at last! But, even supposing so—and I’ve no reason for denying it—I’m not put to a choice between you, am I? Now at all events!”