The griffon, who had been sniffing at Carlotta’s skirts, suddenly leaped into her lap. With a swift movement of her hand she swept the poor little creature, as if it had been a noxious insect, yards away. “Carlotta!” I cried angrily, springing to my feet. The ladies who owned the beast rushed to their whining pet and looked astonished daggers at Carlotta. When they picked it up, it sat dangling a piteous paw. Carlotta rose, merely scared at my anger. I raised my hat. “I am more than sorry. I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I hope the little dog is not hurt. My ward, for whom I offer a thousand apologies, is a Mohammedan, to whom all dogs are unclean. Please attribute the accident to religious instinct.” The younger of the two, who had been examining the paw, looked up with a smile. “Your ward is forgiven. Punch oughtn’t to jump on strange ladies’ laps, whether they are Mohammedans or not. Oh! he is more frightened than hurt. And I,” she added, with a twinkling eye, “am more hurt than frightened, because Sir Marcus Ordeyne doesn’t recognise me.” So Carlotta had nearly killed the dog of an unrecalled acquaintance. “I do indeed recognise you now,” said I, mendaciously. I seem to have been lying to-day through thick and thin. “But in the confusion of the disaster--” “You sat next me at lunch one day last winter, at Mrs. Ordeyne’s,” interrupted the lady, “and you talked to me of transcendental mathematics.” I remembered. “The crime,” said I, “has lain heavily on my conscience.” “I don’t believe a word of it,” she laughed, dismissing me with a bow. I raised my hat and joined Carlotta. It was a Miss Gascoigne, a flirtatious intimate of Aunt Jessica’s house. To this irresponsible young woman I had openly avowed that I was the guardian of a beautiful Mohammedan whose religious instinct compelled her to destroy little dogs. I shall hear of this from my Aunt Jessica. I walked stonily away with Carlotta. “You are cross with me,” she whimpered. “Yes, I am. You might have killed the poor little beast. It was very wicked and cruel of you.” Carlotta burst out crying in the midst of the promenade.