She was now in the adjoining room; but the dust which yet lingered on her small and delicately made shoes of dark green kid would have revealed to the eye of one of those marvels of astuteness who formerly flourished, and, for aught we know, flourish still in the pages of the popular monthlies, that she had recently returned from out of doors. Her perfectly plain skirt, not quite long enough to conceal the shoes already mentioned, might have suggested further that the excursion had not been wholly unconnected with a bicycle. Further incriminating evidence was supplied by a dark cloth jacket, similar in design to that worn by the steward on board a yacht, but ornamented with a number of oxidized steel buttons of the size of crown pieces, and by a straw hat indistinguishable from those ordinarily worn by undergraduates. In spite of these evidences of that removal of the barrier between the sexes which is the crowning triumph of our civilization, Lady Victoria was a most attractive girl. She was not quite so youthful as the marchioness, but that could hardly have been expected. At twenty, one is usually a hardened woman of the world; at forty, one begins to be an innocent little thing. We have hinted that Lady Victoria had just returned from a bicycle ride. It is necessary to add that she had not returned alone. The companion who had escorted her, not only to the door of the house, but up-stairs, to that of the drawing-room, was a tall, fine-looking man of twenty-eight or thirty, whose whole surface, from his boots to his forehead, gleamed with that excess of physical polish which is the religion of the British soldier. It is not the only religion which demands some intellectual sacrifice on the part of its votaries. As soon as the two were inside the room, Lady Victoria turned to her companion. “How can you be so imprudent, Gerald! Do you know my mother is in the next room?” Captain Mauleverer walked boldly forward, and sat down without waiting to be asked. “Certainly,” he answered, coolly. “That is the reason why I have come into this room. It was not my aunt whom I wanted to see. You know, we are barely on speaking terms.” “You needn’t tell me that. I assure you my mother has taken good care to let me know her opinion of you. I warn you plainly that if she comes in and finds you here, I shall abandon you to her.” Captain Mauleverer tried to look unconcerned. “I didn’t think you were such a coward as that, Vick,” he remonstrated. “But, after all, I don’t see that I have done anything so very dreadful. She can’t forbid me the house altogether, you know. I’m her own husband’s nephew.” Lady Victoria smiled with good-natured scorn. “That’s nothing. You don’t know my mother. She wouldn’t hesitate to forbid her husband the house, if she wanted to. Husbands occupy a very uncertain position in society nowadays; they are only tolerated.” “Is that a warning for me, I wonder?”