Mary Blanchet went to the door and exchanged a brief word or two with Minola, in order that she might be prepared for her visitors. Minola came in, looking very handsome, with her color heightened by a quick walk home and the little excitement of her morning. "How lovely you are looking, Nola, dear!" Lucy exclaimed, after the first greetings were over. "You look as if you had been having an adventure." "I have had a sort of adventure," Minola answered with a faint blush. The one thought went through the minds of all her listeners at the same moment, and it shaped itself into a name--"Mr. Augustus Sheppard." All were silent and breathless. "It was not much," Minola hastened to say. "Only I met Mr. Victor Heron in Regent's Park, and I have been walking with him." Most of her listeners seemed relieved. "I wish I had met him," Lucy blurted out. "He is very handsome, and I should like to have walked with him. Oh, what nonsense I am talking!" and she grew red, and jumped up and looked out of the window. Then they all talked about something else, and the visit closed with a promise that Minola and Mary Blanchet would present themselves at one of Mrs. Money's little weekly receptions, out of season, which was to take place the following evening; and after which Mrs. Money hoped to decoy them into staying for the night. Mary Blanchet went to bed that night in an ecstasy of happiness, only disturbed now and then by a torturing doubt as to whether Mrs. Money would be equally willing to receive her if she had known that she had been the keeper of the court-house at Keeton; and whether she ought not to forewarn Mrs. Money of the fact; and whether she ought not, at least, to call Minola's attention to the question, and submit to her judgment. CHAPTER IX. IN SOCIETY. Mr. Money was not a very regular visitor at his wife's little receptions out of the season. In the season, and when they had larger and more formal gatherings, he showed himself as much as was fitting and regular; for many of the guests then were virtually his guests, persons who desired especially to see him, and of whose topics he could talk. A good many foreign visitors were there usually--scientific men, and railway contractors, and engineers, and shipbuilders, from Germany, Italy, and Russia, and of course the United States, who looked upon Mr. Money as a person of great importance and distinction, and would not have cared anything about most of Mrs. Money's guests.