"Poor old Parsons! He thinks I'm going to the devil! Well, I wonder what's in the wind?" observed Dudley aloud to himself when he was again alone. "I've noticed a curious change in Claudia's manner of late. What can be her object in bringing about my marriage, except that perhaps my alliance with one or other of the insipid young ladies who are so often passed before me for inspection, might stifle the ugly scandal that seems to have arisen about us. She's a clever woman--the cleverest woman in London, but horribly indiscreet. I wonder whether that's really the truth. But marriage! _Au grand jamais_!" and he raised his glass again and took a deep draught. "No," he went on, "Claudia is never so charming as when she has some little intrigue or other on hand; but I must really get at the bottom of this, and find out the _belle inconnue_. Parsons is no fool, but the old boy is a Methodist, and hates everything in petticoats," and he laughed lightly to himself as he recollected the old fellow's sage, and perhaps justifiable, reprimands in his wilder college days. "I know I've been a fool--an absolute, idiotic fool with Claudia--and she's been equally foolish. People have talked, but without any foundation for their impertinent gossip, and now she, of course, finds herself in a hole. Dick Nevill was the best of good fellows, but she never loved him. Her marriage was merely one of her _caprices de coeur_. I don't think she could really love anybody for longer than a week. Yes, Parsons is right. He always is. I've been an ass--a downright ass!" he added with sudden emphasis. "I must go and see her tomorrow, and end all this confounded folly." From the table he took up the letter he had received on his return home, and about which he had questioned his servant. Again he read it through, stroking his dark moustache thoughtfully, and knitting his brows. "Writing is woman's _metier_. I wonder what she wants to see me about so particularly," he went on, still speaking to himself. "I wired to her saying, `The House is sitting late,' so she surely couldn't be expecting me. But it's rather unusual for her to send out urgent notes at midnight. No, _la belle capricieuse_ has no discretion--she never will have." And although the great marble clock on the mantelshelf chimed four, he sat with his dark and serious eyes fixed upon the embers, reviewing the chapters of his past.