This last feeling may have been in accordance with the rules of Kismet, but it certainly was not in accordance with the practice of the world. There were many men in his old regiment, and generally throughout the brigade of Guards,--men who, as professedly _coureurs des dames_, held that, for the correct carrying out of a flirtation with a married woman, an intimacy of a certain kind with the lady's husband was almost indispensable. And, though not good at argument, had they been put to it, they could have indorsed their _dicta_ with plenty of examples. They could have told of picnics improvised solely for the pleasure of madame's society, when monsieur was of the greatest assistance, the life and soul of the party, opening champagne, finding salt, cracking jokes; the only man who could induce the gathered leaves to burst into a fire for kettle-boiling purposes; the first to volunteer to sit in the rumble with the captain's valet on the journey homewards. They could have told of visits paid in opera-boxes at a time when it was certain that monsieur was just smacking his lips over something peculiar in claret at a dinner at the Junior, specially given by the captain's brother-officer, the major. They could have told of capital fishing and excellent shooting obtained by them for monsieur with a tendency in that direction; stream or lake, moor or stubble, always happening to be at a very remote distance from monsieur's family abode. There were even some of them who for the time being would thoroughly interest themselves in monsieur and his affairs, would bear with his children, would listen to his stories, would, on rare occasions, be seen about with him, and would, when very hard hit, invite him to the Windsor mess, or give him a seat in the Derby drag. But that sort of thing did not do for Laurence Alsager. Such a line of conduct might have suited him once; but it would have been years ago, and with a very different style of wife and husband from Lady Mitford and Sir Charles. He could not think of her with any feeling that was not deeply tinged with respect, and that in itself was sufficient to remove this new passion from the category of his past loves. His new passion? Yes; he could not deny it to himself; he felt a singular interest in this woman; there was an attraction in her such as he had never experienced in any one else. He smiled as he recollected how in the bygone times he would have called her "cold" and "statuesque;" how he would have despised her slight figure, and thought her manners rustic, if not _gauche_. How he had sneered at love, as distinguished from intrigue, when he was a mere boy; and now, at thirty, after thirteen years of hard life of all kinds--traces of which might be seen in a few lines round the eyes and on the forehead--he was lapsing into the calf-love which boys at school feel for the master's daughter. He laughed; but he knew it was all true, nevertheless.