It was not often that Miss Desmond indulged in such a speech as this, or perhaps even remorseful Maude could scarcely have endured her companionship. She sometimes made herself very agreeable during those idle rainy mornings in which Maude and Harcourt practised the old concertante duets for flute and piano, or dawdled amongst the delicate ferns with the crackjaw names in the little fernery that opened out of the boudoir; or devised gorgeously incomprehensible illuminations for an obscure verse in Malachi. Julia could never be charming, for the power to charm is a gift _sui generis_, and does not necessarily go along with versatile accomplishments or intellectual superiority; but she could be an amusing and agreeable companion whenever she pleased to exhibit herself in that character, and she did so please very frequently; for it is so much less trouble to be agreeable than to be disagreeable, that the most persevering sulker is apt to give way under the weary burden of his own bad temper. But let Miss Desmond be ever so vivacious, or ever so delightful, Harcourt Lowther never lost sight of one fact,--and that was the fact of Julia’s unappeased and unappeasable hatred of Maude Tredethlyn. Stuccoville, which was omniscient of everything, knew that Mr. Tredethlyn had been engaged to Julia, and had jilted her in order to marry Maude; and from Stuccoville Mr. Lowther obtained the clue to the Irish girl’s feelings. “A little genuine feminine malice might be rather a useful element, if I can set it working unconsciously for my benefit. Your amateur’s assistance is generally a dismal failure; but I really think this Miss Desmond might help me. She is so very clever--and so intensely spiteful.” So one morning when Harcourt Lowther happened to find Julia alone in the morning-room, he took the opportunity of being quite confidential upon the subject of Mr. Tredethlyn’s dissipation. “He dined from home yesterday? and the day before? Ah, to be sure, I dined with him the day before,” said Mr. Lowther, with a deprecating sigh. He did not attempt to conceal the fact of his own participation in Francis Tredethlyn’s pleasures; but he contrived in the most subtle manner to make it understood that he accompanied Francis in the character of a guardian angel, a protecting spirit in modern costume, with an arresting hand for ever extended to snatch the sinner from the verge of the precipice. Miss Desmond shrugged her shoulders disdainfully. “I don’t think Mrs. Tredethlyn values her husband’s society sufficiently to feel his neglect very keenly,” she said; “she seems perfectly happy.”