“How hard it is to obtain justice in this world,” he cried, a faint smile on his lips. “How well I know that, far from being reckless, I have exercised the greatest self-restraint. Do you know,--please don’t turn your eyes away,--do you know what temptation I have resisted to-night? Is it not true that the grandeur of a victory lies in the martial power of the enemy overthrown? I would have been a coward had I retreated when you asked me to. Is it not better for us to sit here contentedly and talk of friendship?” She glanced at him deprecatingly. “Do you know,” she said in a tone of sadness, “that there is sometimes a mocking note in your voice and an expression on your face that make me wonder if you ever take yourself or any one else seriously?” She had put into words a doubt that had never before been symbolized in his mind, though often vaguely felt. He was silent for a moment, wondering if it was only his youth, or a fundamental defect in character, that had awakened in her a questioning that found so unwelcome a response in his own heart. Unfortunate is that man who finds nothing at the very depths of his own personality but an interrogation mark. “Are you not unreasonable?” he suggested quietly, striving to obtain self-justification. “When I speak earnestly--and honestly--you ask me to leave you. When I openly ratify the terms upon which you allow me to remain, you say I jest. I almost despair of ever winning your favor.” She smiled encouragingly. “I like you now,” she remarked frankly. “Perhaps, after all, I am not as daring a rebel as I once told you that I was.” Some one had entered the drawing-room; and turning toward the portière, they saw Percy-Bartlett, his pale face just a shade whiter than usual. “Good-evening, Stoughton,” he said, coming forward and giving the young man his hand. “Harriet, we ask your indulgence. Shall we smoke here or go into the library?” Richard’s first inclination was to take his departure at once, but he realized in time the awkwardness that would attend such a step. “Always the slaves to habit!” cried Mrs. Percy-Bartlett, with a vivacity born of nervous reaction rather than of satisfaction at the _contretemps_. “I long ago gave up the idea of defending my music-room from cigar-smoke, Mr. Stoughton. In fact, I have become fond of it. I think,” and she looked at her husband smilingly, but with a gleam of defiance in her eyes, “that I will take to cigarettes. They’re really quite good form in these days, are they not?” “It is hard to say at present,” remarked Percy-Bartlett, puffing his cigar reflectively, “what is good form and what is not. I confess, Stoughton, that I am rather old-fashioned in my ideas.” “For instance?” suggested Richard, not wholly at his ease.