"I--aw--knew your family, I'm sure--aw, quite sure," he said. "You know, of course, that I lived in your--aw--delightful city for some years. Strange we never met, 'pon my soul." "Oh, New York's a pretty big place, Mr. Medcroft," said Freddie good-naturedly. He was a slight young fellow with a fresh, inquisitive face. "It's bigger than London in some ways. It's bigger upwards. Say, do you know, you remind me of a fellow I knew in New York!" "Haw, haw!" laughed Brock, without grace or reason. Miss Fowler caught her breath sharply. "Fellow named Brock. Stupid sort of chap, my mother says. I--" "Oh, dear me, Mr. Ulstervelt," cried Edith, breaking in, "you shan't say anything mean about Mr. Brock. He's my husband's best friend." "I didn't say it, Mrs. Medcroft. It was my mother." Brock was hiding a smile behind his hand. "She knows him better than I. To tell the truth, I've never met him, but I've seen him on the Fifth Avenue stages. You _do_ look like him, though, by Jove." "It's extraordinary how many people think I look like dear old Brock," said the false Roxbury. "But, on the other hand, most people think that Brock looks like me, so what's the odds? Haw, haw! Ripping! Eh, Mr. Rodney?" "Ripping? Ripping what? Good God, am I ripping anything?" gasped Mr. Rodney, who was fussy and fat and generally futile. He seemed to grow suddenly uncomfortable, as if ripping was a habit with him. Dinner was a success. Brock shone with a refulgence that bedimmed all expectations. His wife was delighted; in all of the four years of married life, Roxbury had never been so brilliant, so deliciously English (to use her own expression). Constance tingled with pride. Of late, she had experienced unusual difficulty in diverting her gaze from the handsome impostor, and her thoughts were ever of him--in justification of a platonic interest, of course, no more than that. To-night her eyes and thoughts were for him alone,--a circumstance which, could he have felt sure, would have made him wildly happy, instead of inordinately furious in his complete misunderstanding of her manner toward Freddie Ulstervelt, who had no compunction about making love to two girls at the same time. She was never so beautiful, never so vivacious, never so resourceful. Brock was under the spell; he was fascinated; he had to look to himself carefully in order to keep his wits in the prescribed channel.