“You generally come so late, Mr. Lowther,” she said. “Those were the Dudley Boltons whom you met going out--nice people, fresh from the wolds of Yorkshire, quite new to town, people who come once in ten years or so, when there’s an International Exhibition, or something of that kind. Isn’t it strange that people _can_ be so civilized living in the depths of the country--read the last novel--see the last great picture--because you see, nowadays, great pictures jog about the country like popular prime ministers, and if Mahomet can’t go to the mountain in Trafalgar Square, the mountain goes to meet Mahomet in his provincial town. But I want to introduce you to Miss Desmond, the daughter of the late Colonel Desmond, papa’s oldest friend. Julia dear, Mr. Lowther has heard me talk of you perpetually, and you have heard a good deal of him,”--Mrs. Tredethlyn blushed a little as she said this,--“so I expect you to be intensely intimate immediately.” This introduction took place towards the close of June, nearly a month after the Oaks day; and during the time that had elapsed since that event, Harcourt Lowther, in his character of Mephistopheles, had found Faust what is popularly called a very troublesome customer. Francis Tredethlyn had a secret, and so far it had been a secret which Mr. Lowther could neither penetrate nor turn to his own use. Yes, this simple-minded Cornishman, whose confiding candour had revealed every feeling, and every shade of feeling, to his baneful companion, had his secret now, and seemed to know very well how to keep it. There were days on which he had business which took him a little way out of town; and Harcourt Lowther, pumping never so wisely, could pump no further information out of the secret depths of his friend’s mind. He had even proposed to accompany Francis on these mysterious excursions, but his friendly offers had been met by a point-blank refusal. He had ventured a little playful _badinage_; he had gone so far as to make an occasional insinuation; but Francis Tredethlyn had repelled his hints with the fiery indignation of a man whose tenderest and noblest feelings are involved in the subject of his friend’s _persiflage_. “I know you get plenty of pleasant little witticisms of that kind out of those flimsy-covered books Mr. Jeffs supplies you with; but hadn’t you better keep them for Mrs. de Rothsay’s next evening party? They tell so much better amongst people who understand the French phrases you’re so fond of using. Some of your best things might as well be Greek, so far as I am concerned,” Mr. Tredethlyn said, coolly. Mephistopheles shrugged his shoulders in mild deprecation of his pupil’s impertinence. Faust was positively beginning to acquire the tone of good society. He was learning to be insolent.