used. Hers was the charm of the Shulamite. In meeting Sir Percy her manner and tone were perfectly calm, friendly and composed. Towards her father she was always perfect; and his air of tender, chivalrous protection was touching and beautiful. The three sat around the fire and talked intimately, as friends do after a long absence. Mrs. Vernon offered Sir Percy a cup of tea, and even handed it to him with her own hands sparkling with gems, but he declined it. If it had been in Italy during the time of the Borgias he would have hesitated to drink any cup offered him by Alicia Vernon. She said little, leaving the conversation chiefly to her father and Sir Percy. As they talked she sat in a large chair, her head half turned towards Sir Percy and holding between the fire and her face an antique fan painted by Greuze. She had been a slip of a girl when her lips had sought Sir Percy’s, and had shown him, in triumph, her long, bright hair; but in some things she was unchanged, and Sir Percy felt that a stripling of to-day, such as he had been in the old days, would not be safe with Mrs. Vernon. While they were talking Lord Baudesert’s card was brought to General Talbott. On it was scrawled: "My first chance to take the air. Gout has me by the leg, so come down and drive with me for an hour." General Talbott rose at once. Sir Percy had no excuse to leave at the same time and remained perforce. When the door was shut on General Talbott Sir Percy Carlyon’s face changed into the hardness of a flint, and he sat silent waiting to see what position Mrs. Vernon would take with him. She too remained silent for a while, fixing upon him two wells of violet light. The setting sun streamed through a western window upon Sir Percy’s face, and she studied it carefully. No; he was not handsome even as a young man, and at thirty-eight his moustache was growing grey and his hair scanty, and there were crow’s feet in the corners of his eyes. But what did that matter to her? He was the most considerable man upon whom she had ever tried her power. "After all," she said presently, her low voice filling the room as a trained singer’s softest note is heard at the Paris Opera, "I was right even in my youth, and knew that before you was a great destiny. You are to be the next Ambassador here." "How did you know that?" asked Sir Percy. "Partly by observation and partly by a clever guess. I have been staying in the same house with the Prime Minister, and quite naturally we spoke of you. I told him that we were old friends." As she said the last two words Sir Percy Carlyon turned away his head and a dull flush dyed his sunburnt face. "However, those are matters really of prescience. I was very young when we loved, but even then I knew that some day you would be a great, if not a famous, man." "I am neither," responded Sir Percy, taking refuge in commonplace.