The two ladies walked several times up and down the terrace; but in spite of Cecil's efforts the conversation still flagged. When Cecil admired the view, Mrs. Lobyer owned that it was charming--while the magic of novelty lasted. "One gets used to it," Flo said indifferently. "I dare say if people could live on the summit of the Matterhorn, they would get used to that, and think very little of it. When first I came here I used to look out of my dressing-room window and admire the prospect while Carstairs was dressing my hair; and now I take no more notice of the view than if I were living in Russell Square." After this Mrs. Lobyer relapsed into silence; and perceiving that she was preoccupied, Cecil abandoned herself to her own meditations, though not without some wonderment as to why Flo had made such a point of bringing her out on the terrace when she had nothing particular to say to her. They had walked for some time in silence, when the sound of horses' hoofs upon the hard carriage-drive made them both look up. The pretty pink flush deepened ever so little on Mrs. Lobyer's cheeks as a horseman, followed by his groom, rode rapidly towards the terrace steps. "It is Sir Nugent Evershed," said Flo; "now, Cecil, you are going to see one of the best men of the country--enormous wealth, without the faintest association with the money-market,--and oh, how delightful money without the market must be!--and an interminable line of ancestors; though, if ancestors didn't generally reveal themselves in high insteps, aquiline noses, and taper fingers, I shouldn't set any particular value upon _them_." All this was said very rapidly, very gaily, very lightly; but lightly as it was said, Lady Cecil wondered a little at the warmth of Mrs. Lobyer's complexion and the new brightness in Mrs. Lobyer's eyes. Sir Nugent Evershed surrendered his horse to the groom at the bottom of the terrace-steps, and came on foot to greet the ladies. He was one of those rare exotics--those hothouse flowers in the garden of youth--which, so long as grace and beauty are worshipped upon the earth, will always find tender cherishers, even though some drops of subtile poison mingle with the perfume,--even though a base of clay sustain the torso of the god. He was the very pink and pattern of the _jeunesse dorée_, the type of man that has appeared with but little variation of form in every century; the Alcibiades, the Essex, the Cinq Mars, the George Villiers, the handsome Lord Hervey, the butterfly whose gilded wings excite the indignation of wiser men, but who laughs at their wisdom and defies their scorn, serene in the enjoyment of his butterfly triumphs. Sir Nugent was fair, with blue eyes and pale-amber moustache and whiskers. The Alcibiades of the present day is generally of a fair complexion, and our friends on the other side of the Channel may talk now of the _blonde meesters_ as well as the _blonde meess_ of the _brumeuse Angleterre_.