_Spurr. (aghast)._ Your brother! Sir RUPERT CULVERIN your----! Excuse me--if I'd only known, I--I do assure you I never should have dreamt of saying----! _Lady Cant. (graciously)._ You've said nothing whatever to distress yourself about. You couldn't possibly be expected to know who I was. Perhaps I had better tell you at once that I am Lady CANTIRE, and this is my daughter, Lady MAISIE MULL. (SPURRELL _returns_ Lady MAISIE'S _little bow in the deepest confusion._) We are going down to Wyvern too, so I hope we shall very soon become better acquainted. _Spurr. (to himself, overwhelmed)._ The deuce we shall! I _have_ got myself into a hole this time; I wish I could see my way well out of it! Why on earth couldn't I hold my confounded tongue? I _shall_ look an ass when I tell 'em. [_He sits staring at them in silent embarrassment._ SCENE V.--_A Second-Class Compartment._ _Undershell (to himself)._ Singularly attractive face this girl has; so piquant and so refined! I can't help fancying she is studying me under her eyelashes. She has remarkably bright eyes. Can she be interested in me? does she expect me to talk to her? There are only she and I--but no, just now I would rather be alone with my thoughts. This MAISIE MULL whom I shall meet so soon; what is _she_ like, I wonder? I presume she is unmarried. If I may judge from her artless little letter, she is young and enthusiastic, and she is a passionate admirer of my verse; she is longing to meet me. I suppose some men's vanity would be flattered by a tribute like that. I think I must have none; for it leaves me strangely cold. I did not even reply; it struck me that it would be difficult to do so with any dignity, and she didn't tell me where to write to.... After all, how do I know that this will not end--like everything else--in disillusion? Will not such crude girlish adoration pall upon me in time? If she were exceptionally lovely; or say, even as charming as this fair fellow-passenger of mine--why then, to be sure--but no, something warns me that that is not to be. I shall find her plain, sandy, freckled; she will render me ridiculous by her undiscriminating gush.... Yes, I feel my heart sink more and more at the prospect of this visit. Ah me! [_He sighs heavily._ _His Fellow Passenger (to herself)._ It's too silly to be sitting here like a pair of images, considering that----(_Aloud._) I hope you aren't feeling unwell? _Und._ Thank you, no, not unwell. I was merely thinking. _His Fellow P._ You don't seem very cheerful over it, I must say. I've no wish to be inquisitive, but perhaps you're feeling a little lowspirited about the place you're going to? _Und._ I--I must confess I am rather dreading the prospect. How wonderful that you should have guessed it!