From the stucco porticoes of the mansions slanting shadows were cast over the doors. A woman in a blue cap crying "Chairs to mend!" moved slowly along; a few passers-by were gathered, with an air of curiosity, about an elegant green curricle that waited outside a house in no way different from the others, save that the shutters were up in every window but those on the second floor. This equipage excited attention, not only by the manifest splendour of the white horses, the sumptuous livery of the footman, and the gold-plated harness, but by the fact that the small crest on the body of the chariot was that of the famous Lord Lyndwood, a name they all knew as that of the most brilliant personage in that brilliant but vague world of fashion that sparkled somewhere beyond their vision. At one of the unshuttered windows stood the owner of the green chariot, observing languidly the prospect of the wide sunny street, broken by the little knot of people about the curricle, and the slow-moving figure of the chair-mender, with her slender bundle of canes under her arm. Rose Lyndwood saw these things as a bright, expressionless picture. Even the blue sky arching the houses had no meaning; but the thick dust that stirred in the slow breeze and whitened the dry aspect of the street conveyed a quiet dreariness. The Earl moved away from the window, and his half-veiled gaze dwelt on the details of the lofty chamber in which he waited. Everything was very new, very magnificent. A cold, uncultured taste expressed itself in stiff, splendid furniture; in pictures selected for no reason, it seemed, but their bright colours and their massive frames, and in enormous mirrors that, rising from floor to ceiling, reflected their glories again and again after the manner of a public dancing-room. The chairs and settees wore linen covers that concealed all but their shining gilt legs. There were no flowers in the painted vases nor any small or intimate object to disturb the stately expanses of the marble-topped tables and Japan cabinets; it appeared a room never often used and of late long shut up. Rose Lyndwood walked softly up and down. He had his hat under his arm and his gloved hands clasped behind him; he wore an olive-green riding-coat, his hair unpowdered and plainly arranged. He was utterly out of harmony with his surroundings. It might be that he was aware of this, for when he saw his image in the ostentatious mirrors he very slightly smiled, and not pleasantly. The sunlight entered by the tall bare window and lay in a great square on the highly coloured carpet, dazzling in its passage on the flaunting gold of furniture and pictures. Lord Lyndwood paced to and fro, glancing, when he reached the window, at the green chariot below, with its idle admirers, and at the empty street beyond, and when he reached the great glass the other end of the chamber at the reflection of his own superb person with that slight and sneering smile.