Lothaw’s heart was touched. His deeply religious convictions were impressed. He instantly went up to this gifted being, confessed, and received absolution. “To-morrow,” he said to himself, “I will partake of the communion, and endow the Church with my vast estates. For the present I’ll let the improved cottages go.” CHAPTER IV As Lothaw turned to leave the Cardinal, he was struck by a beautiful face. It was that of a matron, slim but shapely as an Ionic column. Her face was Grecian, with Corinthian temples; Hellenic eyes that looked from jutting eyebrows, like dormer-windows in an Attic forehead, completed her perfect Athenian outline. She wore a black frock-coat tightly buttoned over her bloomer trousers, and a standing collar. “Your lordship is struck by that face?” said a social parasite. “I am; who is she?” “Her name is Mary Ann. She is married to an American, and has lately invented a new religion.” “Ah!” said Lothaw eagerly, with difficulty restraining himself from rushing toward her. “Yes; shall I introduce you?” Lothaw thought of Lady Coriander’s High Church proclivities, of the Cardinal, and hesitated: “No, I thank you, not now.” CHAPTER V Lothaw was maturing. He had attended two womens’ rights conventions, three Fenian meetings, had dined at White’s, and had danced _vis-a-vis_ to a prince of the blood, and eaten off gold plates at Crecy House. His stables were near Oxford, and occupied more ground than the University. He was driving over there one day, when he perceived some rustics and menials endeavoring to stop a pair of runaway horses attached to a carriage in which a lady and gentleman were seated. Calmly awaiting the termination of the accident, with high-bred courtesy Lothaw forbore to interfere until the carriage was overturned, the occupants thrown out, and the runaways secured by the servants, when he advanced and offered the lady the exclusive use of his Oxford stables. Turning upon him a face whose perfect Hellenic details he remembered, she slowly dragged a gentleman from under the wheels into the light, and presented him with ladylike dignity as her husband, Major-General Camperdown, an American. “Ah,” said Lothaw carelessly, “I believe I have some land there. If I mistake not, my agent, Mr. Putney Giles, lately purchased the State of—Illinois—I think you call it.” “Exactly. As a former resident of the city of Chicago, let me introduce myself as your tenant.” Lothaw bowed graciously to the gentleman, who, except that he seemed better dressed than most Englishmen, showed no other signs of inferiority and plebeian extraction. “We have met before,” said Lothaw to the lady as she leaned on his arm, while they visited his stables, the University, and other places of interest in Oxford, “Pray tell me, what is this new religion of yours?” “It is Woman Suffrage, Free Love, Mutual Affinity, and Communism. Embrace it and me.”