My lord, I think, read his daughter very well, and, being determined to afford me an opportunity to make my peace, engaged Lord Carford in conversation, and bade her lead me into the room behind to see the picture that Lely had lately painted of her. She obeyed; and, having brought me to where it hung, listened patiently to my remarks on it, which I tried to shape into compliments that should be pleasing and yet not gross. Then, taking courage, I ventured to assure her that I fell out with Lord Carford in sheer ignorance that he was a friend of her family, and would have borne anything at his hands had I known it. She smiled, answering, "But you did him no harm," and she glanced at my arm in its sling. She had not troubled herself to ask how it did, and I, a little nettled at her neglect, said: "Nay, all ended well. I alone was hurt, and the great lord came off safe." "Since the great lord was in the right," said she, "we should all rejoice at that. Are you satisfied with your examination of the picture, Mr Dale?" I was not to be turned aside so easily. "If you hold me to have been wrong, then I have done what I could to put myself in the right since," said I, not doubting that she knew of my surrender of the commission. "I don't understand," said she, with a quick glance. "What have you done?" In wonder that she had not been informed, I cried, "I have obtained the King's leave to decline his favour." The colour which had been on her cheeks when she first entered had gone before now, but at my words it returned a little. "Didn't my lord tell you?" I asked. "I haven't seen him alone this week past," she answered. But she had seen Carford alone, and that in the last hour past. It was strange that he, who had known my intention and commended it so highly, should not have touched on it. I looked in her eyes; I think she followed my thoughts, for she glanced aside, and said in visible embarrassment, "Shall we return?" "You haven't spoken on the matter with my Lord Carford, then?" I asked. She hesitated a moment, then answered as though she did not love the truth but must tell it, "Yes; but he said nothing of this. Tell me of it." So I told her in simple and few words what I had done. "Lord Carford said nothing of it," she said, when I ended. Then she added, "But although you will not accept the favour, you have rendered thanks for it?" "I couldn't find my tongue when I was with the King," I answered with a shamefaced laugh. "I didn't mean to the King," said Barbara. It was my turn to colour now; I had not been long enough in town to lose the trick. "I have seen her," I murmured. Barbara suddenly made me a curtsey, saying bitterly, "I wish you joy, sir, of your acquaintance." When a man is alone with a beautiful lady, he is apt not to love an intruder; yet on my soul I was glad to see Carford in the doorway. He came towards us, but before he could speak Barbara cried to him,