ean, is it not so?"

She merely smiled, patting his ruffles with delicate fondling fingers.
It was never her habit to argue with her Duke.

"What!" he cried smilingly, "none of that, but contradict me if you
dare."

"I never contradict his Grace the Duke of Argyll," said she, stepping
back and sweeping the floor with her gown in a stately courtesy; "it is
not right, and it is not good for him--at his age."

"Ah, you rogue!" he cried, laughing. "But soberly now, you are too hard
on poor Sim. It is the worst--the only vice of good women that they have
no charity left for the imperfect either of their own sex or of mine.
Let us think what an atom of wind-blown dust is every human being at the
best, bad or good in his blood as his ancestry may have been, kind or
cruel, straight or crooked, pious or pagan, admirable or evil, as the
accidents of his training or experience shall determine. As I grow older
I grow more tolerant, for I have learned that my own scanty virtues and
graces are no more my own creation than the dukedom I came into from my
father--or my red hair."

"Not red, Archie," said the Duchess, "not red, but reddish fair; in
fact, a golden;" and she gently pulled a curl upon his temple. "What
about our Frenchman? Is he to lie in the fosse till the Sheriff sends
for him or till the great MacCailen Mor has forgiven him for telling him
he was a little over the age of thirty?"

"For once, my dear, you cannot have your way," said the Duke firmly. "Be
reasonable! We could not tolerate so scandalous an affair without some
show of law and--"

"Tolerate!" said the Duchess. "You are very hard on poor Montaiglon,
Archie, and all because he fought a duel with a doubtful gentleman who
will be little the worse for it in a week or two. Let us think," she
went on banteringly--"let us think what an atom of wind-blown dust is
every human being at the best, admirable or evil as his training--"

Her husband stopped her with a kiss.

"No more of that, Jean; the man must thole his trial, for I have gone
too far to draw back even if I had the will to humour you."

There was one tone of her husband's his wife knew too decisive for her
contending with, and now she heard it. Like a wise woman, she made up
her mind to say no more, and she was saved an awkward pause by an uproar
in the fosse. Up to the window where those two elderly lovers had their
kindly disputation came the sound of cries. Out into the dusk of the
evening Arg