"You're looking very well, Drake," said Lady Northgate, as her husband, struggling with a fearful yawn, sauntered away. "And not at all unhappy." Drake shrugged his shoulders. "What's the use? Of course, it's a bad business for me; but all the yowling in the world wouldn't better it. What can't be cured must be endured." Lady Northgate nodded at him approvingly. "I knew you'd take it like this," she said. "You won't go down to Harry for a little while?" "Oh, no," said Drake, with a smile. "I'm going the round; I'm not going to shirk it." He was one of the most popular men in London, and there were many in the room who really sympathized with and were sorry for him; and Drake, as he exchanged greetings with one and another, felt that the thing hadn't been so bad, after all. He made this consoling reflection as he leaned against the wall beside a chair in which sat a lady whom he did not know, and at whom he had scarcely glanced; and he was roused from his reverie by her saying: "May I venture to trouble you to put this glass down?" He took the glass and set it on the pedestal of the statuette beside him, and, as in duty bound, returned to the lady. She was an extremely pretty little woman, with soft brown hair and extremely bright eyes, which, notwithstanding their brightness, were not at all hard. He felt, rather than knew, that she was perfectly dressed, and he noticed that she wore remarkably fine diamonds. They sparkled and glittered in her hair, on her bosom, on her wrists, and on her fingers. He had never seen her before, and he wondered who she was. "You have just come up from the country?" she said. The accent with which she made this rather startling remark betrayed her nationality to Drake. The American accent, when it is voiced by a person of culture and refinement, is an extremely pretty one; the slight drawl is musical, and the emphasis which is given to words not usually made emphatic, is attractive. "Yes," said Drake. "But how did you know that?" "Your face and hands are so brown," she replied, with a frankness which was robbed of all offense by her placidity and unself-consciousness. "Nearly all the men one meets here are so colorless. I suppose it is because you have so little air and sun in London. At first, one is afraid that everybody is ill; but after a time one gets used to it." Drake was amused and a little interested. "Have the men in America so much color?" he asked. "Well, how did you know I was an American?" she inquired, with a charming little air of surprise. "I suppose my speech betrayed me? That is so annoying. I thought I had almost entirely lost my accent." "I don't know why you should want to lose it," said Drake, honestly enough. "It's five hundred times better than our London one!" "I didn't say I wanted to exchange it for that," she remarked. "Don't exchange it for any other, if I may be permitted to say so."