No; Laurence Alsager was certainly not best pleased at all he heard about Mrs. Hammond. Mrs. Hammond, a pretty little woman, coming to call upon you--great Heaven! Is that the way that that oaf Mitford talked of her who two years ago was Laura Molyneux, the mere mention of whose name caused Alsager to thrill to his finger-tips; and whose low _trainante_ voice, long steady passionate glances, and rippling shoulders could have led him to destruction? Drove her chestnuts well, eh? Yes, by Jove! there were few women could touch her either in riding or driving, and--Laurence laughed grimly to himself as he strode along. What was it Dollamore had said about Mitford's readiness to go to the bad, to shake a loose leg, to enjoy those advantages of health, wealth, and position which had before been denied to him? Why, here was the very woman to ensnare him, to act as his evil genius, the very counter-charm of Lady Mitford's quietude and girlish grace; a woman of the world, bright, sharp, active, and alert; with plenty of _savoir fair_, an enormous talent for flirtation, and not the smallest scrap of heart to throw into the balance against any of her whims. No, by George, not a scrap. Laurence bethought him of a certain December morning in Kensington Gardens, and the whole scene rose vividly before him. The trees all stripped and bare, and stridently clanging in the bitter wind; the thick dun clouds hanging over the horizon; the greatcoated park-keeper stamping vigorously over the gravel, and banging himself with his arms with vague notions of generating calorie; and he himself pacing up and down by Laura Molyneux's side. The arguments he had used, the very phrases which he had employed to induce her to reconsider the determination then announced to him, were ringing in his ears. He recollected how he had humbled himself, how he had implored her to reconsider her decision, how even he had begged for time, and how he had been met with one stern pitiless refusal; and how he had gone away to weep bitter tears of mortified pride, and rejected love, and savage disappointment; and how she had stepped into the neat little brougham waiting for her at the gate, and been whirled off to accept the hand and heart of Mr. Percy Hammond, a retired civil-servant from India, a widower with one daughter, who had shaken the pagoda-tree to some purpose and returned to England with a colossal fortune.