Madame shook her head. "I know mine. Tell Mr. Rasper if his invention will succeed. Or, perhaps, Mr. Granger?" "I am at Miss Bull's service," said the polite old gentleman bowing. Miss Bull swept the cards into a heap. "I'm quite willing," she said in a voice almost pleasant for her. "Anything to oblige dear Madame." Mrs. Jersey smiled still more graciously and sailed away to send Mr. Harmer to the cards. But she wondered inwardly why Miss Bull had given way so suddenly. There was some reason for it, as Miss Bull never did anything without a reason. But Mrs. Jersey kept her own counsel, and still continued to smile. She had quite made up her mind how to act. "Ladies and gentlemen," she said, standing in the middle of the drawing-room, "we must disperse to-night at ten. I have some business to attend to, so I request you will all retire at that hour. In the mean time, Miss Bull has kindly consented to tell your fortunes." It was extraordinary to see how those withered old people crowded round the table. Their several fates had long since been settled, so what they could expect the cards to tell them, save that they would one and all die soon, it is difficult to say. Yet so ineradicable is the wish to know the future in the human breast that they were as eager as youth to hear what would befall them. And Miss Bull, wholly unmoved by their senile excitement, dealt the cards with the air of a sphinx. Madame meantime retired to her throne, and saw that the servants arranged the tray properly. She had a gigantic chair, which was jokingly called her throne, and here she received strangers in quite a majestic way. It was a sort of Lady Blessington reception on a small scale, as Mr. Harmer assured her, and, as he had been to Gore House in his youth, he knew what he was talking about. Knowing his courtly manners, and being greedy of compliments, Mrs. Jersey always tried to make him say that she resembled Lady Blessington. But this Mr. Harmer refused to do. Not that Mrs. Jersey was bad-looking. She had a fresh-colored face, bright black eyes, and plenty of white hair like spun silk. Her figure was stout, but she yet retained a certain comeliness which showed that she must have been a handsome woman in her youth. Her manners were motherly, but she showed a stern face toward Margery, and did not treat the girl so kindly as she might have done. As a rule, she had great self-command, but sometimes gave way to paroxysms of passion, which were really terrifying. But Margery alone had been witness of these, and Mrs. Jersey passed for a dear, gentle old lady. "Mr. Harmer is to be married," announced Mrs. Taine, leaving the circle round the card-table; "how extraordinary!" "So extraordinary that it can't possibly be true," said Mr. Harmer, dryly; "unless Madame will accept me," he added, bowing.