She looked splendidly beautiful just at that moment. She was a bright-looking little woman, with deep-gray eyes and long dark lashes, shining chestnut hair, a _retroussé_ nose, a wanton mouth, and a perfect, trim, tight, rounded small figure. As she threw out this verbal challenge, her eyes flashed, she sat erect, and every fibre within her seemed quivering with emotion. Laurence marked her expression, and for an instant softened, as the recollection of the old days, when he had seen her thus wilfully petulant only to make more marked the subsidence into placidity and devotion, rose before him; but it faded rapidly away, had utterly vanished before, no less in reply to her peering gaze than to her words, he said, "No, not war; neighbours who have been so nearly allied should never quarrel. Let us take another strategic phrase, and say that we will preserve an armed neutrality." "And that means--?" "Well, in our case that means that neither shall interfere with the other's plans, of whatever kind, without due warning. That once given and disregarded, there will be war to the knife; for I think under present circumstances neither will be inclined to spare the other." "Your anticipations are of a singularly sombre character, Colonel Alsager. I think that--ah!" she exclaimed, suddenly clapping her hands, "I see it all! my eyes are opened, and the whole map lies patent before me." "What has caused this happy restoration of sight?" "Remembering a story which was told me a day or two ago by a little bird. The story of a _preux chevalier_ and a lady in distress; of a romantic adventure and a terrific leap; of plunging hoofs and fainting-fits, and all the necessary ingredients of such a scene. _Je vous en félicité, Monsieur le Colonel_." Laurence's brow grew very dark as he said, "You are too clever a woman to give a leg-up to a manifestly limping story, however much it might temporarily serve your purpose. Of that story as it stands, turned, twisted, perverted as it may be, nothing can be made. The scandal-mongers don't know what they have taken in hand. They might as well try to shake the Rock of Gibraltar as that lady's good name." Mrs. Hammond laughed a short bitter laugh and said, "You have even lost that grand virtue which you possessed--the power of concealing your emotions. With the gravity, you have attained the simplicity of the Oriental; and you now--" She was interrupted by the servant's throwing open the door and announcing, "Sir Charles Mitford."