“I should never dream of marrying any woman without good breeding and refinement,” the other returned in quiet, decided tones. “But if she be a lady, it will be immaterial to me whether her parents are received at Court or not. Only she must be something unlike the girls I am used to meeting. My sisters, and my sisters’ friends, and girls like the Braithwaites, I cannot tell you how they bore me. I don’t quite know what I do want, but most certainly I don’t want them.” “Granted. But what has all this to do with your mad proposal to exchange names with me? Of course, I shouldn’t consent. But what possible connection is there between your ideal ladylove, and your last crazy notion?” “More than you think. If we should meet her--don’t laugh, anything is possible--if we should, as I say, during the next fortnight, happen to light upon just the woman I am waiting for, I am eccentric enough to wish to stand before her on my own poor merits, with my plain face, and insignificant appearance, my bad temper, and all the rest of it--just Mr. Pritchard, going out to Canada to make his fortune in the autumn. Then I should endeavor to gain her interest, and in time her affection.” “What an extraordinary chap you are for talking nonsense seriously! One would think you expected your ideal young woman to drop from the clouds at the present moment.” “Perhaps I do. Did I ever tell you of my visit to Kyro, the fashionable fate-reader, in Bond Street, last Christmas?” “You don’t mean to say, Carthew, that you are going to take on palmistry?” “I had an hour to fill in before meeting my father,” Lord Carthew continued, quite unmoved by his companion’s raillery, “and as it was too cold to study the shops, and there were no picture-galleries worth seeing open, I dropped into Mlle. Kyro’s. You know what a success she made of it until the police, tired of running in old women for getting sixpences out of servant girls, shut up her entertainment. Well, she was a very charming woman, and didn’t go in for any ‘fee, faw, fum,’ at all. She studied my face and my hands, and after some very happy guessing at what had already happened to me, she proceeded to foretell that in the spring of this year I should meet unexpectedly, while on a journey, a lady with whom I should fall madly in love. Meeting her would, so she declared, alter the whole course of my life. Furthermore, I should marry, and go through a whole sea of trouble, and as far as she would tell me, even worse misfortunes were in store. Kyro, however, with tears in her eyes--very pretty eyes, by the way--begged me to be the arbiter of my own fate. All these troubles could be avoided, so she assured me, if I would be guided by reason and not by passion. I thanked her for her good advice; she gave me a cup of tea and I left the fee on the table, and there is the end of it--or perhaps, the beginning.”