"Never mind, child," she said. "One who doesn't care a farthing about it, at any rate. But look, do you see that tall lady there, dancing with the short man with whiskers? She is the Countess of Pierrepoint, and he is the Duke of Garnum----" "A duke?" said Una, surprised. "You expected to see a man seven feet high in his ducal robes?" she said. "See those two men who have just come in? The dark one is Sir Arkroyd Hetley, the other, the boy--the baby they call him--is a marquis, the Marquis of Dalrymple. They are always together. They are coming to shake hands with me." Una drew further into the shade as the two men, after hunting about the room, came up to the recess, and listened as they paid their compliments and seemed anxious to remain, but Lady Bell sent them off quite plainly and distinctly, and sat looking toward the door, and presently she ceased talking, and her bright, beautiful face grew quiet and almost sad, certainly wistful, and at last she sighed and murmured: "No, he will not come." "Who will not come?" said Una. "Are you expecting any one?" "Did I speak?" she said. "Yes, I am expecting someone, but he will not come. People one expects and wants never do--never do. You will find that out in time, wild bird; you will find--ah!" and she started and turned pale, and her hand, which had been laid on Una's arm, closed over it with a sudden grip and flutter. Una looked up, and her face went deadly white. The room seemed to spin round with her, and the lights to flood her brain and paralyze her, for there, towering above the throng, stood Jack Newcombe. Jack Newcombe--not in his rough tweed suit, but in evening dress; Jack, not with the frank, tender, pleasant smile which always rested upon his face as it appeared in her dreams, but with a cold, half-irritable, and wholly bored expression. Slowly she rose and glided into the shadow of the recess and hid herself, her heart beating wildly, her whole form trembling with a strange ecstasy of mingled fear and delight. At last she saw him again. CHAPTER XXI. Poor Jack! How came he to be in Lady Bell's ball-room? The morning after she had nearly driven over him he woke to find Leonard Dagle, his friend and fellow lodger, standing beside his bed and looking down at him with a grave smile on his intellectual face. "Hallo!" said Jack, "the house on fire?" "Not at present," said Leonard, "though it would soon be if you lived in it alone. Why don't you blow your candle out, and not chuck your slippers at it? How are you this morning?" "How am I?" said Jack, staring. "How should I be? Quite well of course," which was quite true, for Jack and the headache had not been introduced to each other. "That's all right," said Leonard, with a smile. "Perhaps you remember last night's tragic occurrence, then?" Jack thought for a moment, then shook his head gravely.