“Now look at me!” He had the solitaire board on his knee, and a little glass ball, with coloured threads spun into it, between his fingers. “There, and there, and there!” Judith bent forward dutifully, watching how he lifted the marbles, one after the other, from their holes. “Don’t you see?” He looked at her triumphantly, but a little irritated at her obtuseness. “Oh, yes,” said Judith vaguely. “The figure eight--don’t you see?” He pointed to the balls remaining on the board. “So it is! Where did you learn to do that?” she asked, smiling gently. “Ah, that’s telling, isn’t it?” He chuckled slily, swept the balls together with his hand, and announced his intention of going in search of his man, with a view to a game of billiards. Judith sank back in her chair as the door closed on him. The firelight played about her face, which, though not less beautiful, had grown to look older. She had been living hard these last few days. The door opened, and Rose came in with her hat on and a parcel in her hand. “No tea?” she cried, kneeling down on the hearthrug and holding out her hands to the fire. “It isn’t five o’clock yet.” There was an air of tension, of expectancy almost about Judith which contrasted markedly with her habitual serenity. Rose turned suddenly. “When, Judith, _when_?” she cried with immense archness. “I don’t know,” said Judith quietly. There had been a dance the night before at the Kohnthals, where Bertie’s unconcealed devotion to herself had been one of the events of the hour. “Judith!”--Rose regarded her with excitement--“do you mean to say he has--spoken? Or are you humbugging in that serious way of yours?” “Mr. Lee-Harrison has not proposed to me, if that is what you want to know.” Rose unfastened her fur mantle in silence. Something in Judith’s manner puzzled her. “He really is a nice little person,” Rose went on after a pause; “such beautiful manners!” “Oh, he hands plates and opens doors very prettily.” Judith spoke with a certain weary scorn, which Rose accepted as the tone of depreciation natural to a woman who discusses an undeclared admirer. As a matter of fact, Judith recognized clearly the marks of breeding, the hundred and one fine differences which distinguished Bertie from the people of her set, whose manners were almost invariably tinged with respect of persons--that sure foe to respect of humanity. She recognized them and their value as hallmarks, wondering all the time with a dreary wonder, that any one should attach importance to such things as these. For in her heart she despised the man. His intelligent fluency, his unfailing, monotonous politeness were a weariness to her. His very readiness to fall down utterly before her, seemed to her--alas, poor Judith!--in itself a brand of inferiority. “Tea at last,” cried Rose, as the door opened. “And Adelaide. What a scent you have for tea, Addie.”