She repeated his words impatiently. “What have you done? You have brought to my house--or rather you have suggested my bringing there--men whom Gerard would never have allowed me to meet.” “Madame, you astonish me! These men are all of them either very well born or very rich. They are all in the best society, they all belong to the Army and Navy, the Carlton, or----” “Yes, yes, I daresay. But that’s not what I mean. Men without their wives don’t count as society at all.” “Sir Richard Lavering and Mr. Lydd, Lord Barre’s son, have brought their wives.” Audrey frowned. She did not quite like to say what she thought about either of those ladies. “It’s very difficult to get ladies at all at this time of year.” “Then I don’t want their husbands without them,” said Audrey sharply. “You are difficult to please, Madame, to-night. Supposing that the poor fellows are in my own sad plight, and have no wives to bring?” “Then I should like them to stay away,” retorted Audrey. “At any rate I won’t have my house used as if it were a gambling club.” “But you used to play poker yourself with Gerard and me and my friends!” objected Mr. Candover rather piteously. Her face quivered. “That was very different. Between what I did when Gerard was with me and what I do now, there is, or there ought to be, a wide gulf. I can’t understand how a clever man like you can fail to see that.” He looked down at her with an expression of infinite solicitude. “Perhaps I do see it. Perhaps, seeing it clearly, I yet feel that the course I have proposed to you, the course of conciliating the people who may be of use to you, the making to yourself friends of the Mammon of Unrighteousness in fact, is the best course.” “But I don’t like them!” pleaded Audrey. “I don’t like the way they behave to me. They think, because I am engaged in business, trade in fact, that they can use my house as they please, and treat me as they please.” “Scarcely that, Madame. You know nobody would dare to treat you in any but the right way in my presence,” said Mr. Candover, growing more earnest as he bent to speak low in her ear. Audrey frowned, finding a difficulty in defining her grievance. “Of course, they’re not openly insulting, I don’t mean that. But--there’s a subtle difference. Oh, you’re a man, why do you pretend not to know between the civility with which a man of this sort treats the women of his own set, and the manner he uses to women whom he looks upon as--as not belonging to his world?” “Look here, Madame, you must lay aside some of these fine feelings, or you must lay aside the hope of getting on in business. If you like, instead of the men of the Carlton, the Beefsteak and the Jockey Club, I’ll bring down next time the members of the Athenæum, including the whole bench of bishops. They won’t play cards, they won’t pay compliments, but they’ll all be too deaf to answer what you say to them, and they won’t buy so much as a bonnet,” retorted Mr. Candover, impatiently.