Curtseys from the ladies to his Grace, bows of the courtliest ere he would seat himself beside them. Her Ladyship’s dream blew away like a gay-coloured bubble in a breeze that must shatter it. A dream indeed. There was another future in store for the young creature beside her and she herself was pledged to it. “You come very seasonable!” says she, gathering up her fan and gloves,—“for I am expected at my Lady Carteret’s for basset and scandal. At least four reputations will escape with scarce a scratch if I am absent. ’Tis me for the death-blow!” She drew her gay glitter over her face as quick as her capuchin over her damask gown. It needed the time and the place for my Lady to disclose the unmodish truth that among her other possessions she ranked a heart and a true one. Bolton however needed not testimony. She kissed Diana on the cheek at parting, and turning on her little heel, made to go. At the door she paused, Bolton leading her. “Diana,” says she, “for a moment I will play Mr. Pope’s oracle at Delphi. Happiness has wings. When she alights, capture her that moment. Cage her, close the door on the lovely thing, for if she flies she flies for ever. Be wise in time!” She curtseyed once more and tripped downstairs all gaiety, touching his hand with but the tips of her fingers. As he handed her down the great steps she paused a moment more, and said softly: “Were I a man and such a woman within my reach, I would win her if I died for it.” “And I,” said he, “if I did not bring her dishonour for my first lover’s gift.” “I think—” says my Lady deliberately, “that honour and dishonour are words we play with. Honour is a thing of the soul. It resides within and none but ourselves shall judge for us. The world cannot.” She looked strangely at him, and was gone. “I have done my part by Kitty, but how about Diana?” says she to herself, watching him reascend the steps. Being much at his ease in that house he went up again unannounced and Diana, thinking him gone for good, was still in her chair, snipping away patiently at the Duchess’s little figures. She spent much time in catching up with her Grace’s cast needleworks and others, for ’twas Kitty’s way to snatch at a pleasure and forsake it almost instantly for the next, Diana or another following in her wake to gather the fragments. So he found her, leaning pensive over her paper gods and goddesses. “I rejoice I find you alone, Madam,” say he, standing very tall and troubled before her—“I would hear how you do. You are still pale—almost as when I saw you in that cursed room. O, ’tis too much to think on what you suffered. But are you indeed well?” She looked up and would have spoke, but he was instantly at her feet. “If to have dreamed of you nightly and thought of you the live-long day deserves compassion, grant it to me, and answer me one question—one only!”