the grip of which she still found herself. She had been
aware, as she tried to talk to Warren Trowbridge, of Trixton Brent's
glance, and of a certain hostility from Mrs. Chandos that caused her now
to grow warm with a kind of shame when she thought of it. But she could
not deny that this man had for her a fascination. There was in him an
insolent sense of power, of scarcely veiled contempt for the company
in which he found himself. And she asked herself, in this mood of
introspection, whether a little of his contempt for Lily Dallam's guests
had not been communicated from him to her.

When she had risen to leave, he had followed her into the entry. She
recalled him vividly as he had stood before her then, a cigar in one
hand and a lighted match in the other, his eyes fixed upon her with a
singularly disquieting look that was tinged, however, with amusement.
"I'm coming to see you," he announced.

"Do be careful," she had cried, "you'll burn yourself!"

"That," he answered, tossing away the match, "is to be expected."

She laughed nervously.

"Good night," he added, "and remember my bet."

What could he have meant when he had declared that she would not remain
in Quicksands?

CHAPTER VI. GAD AND MENI.

There was an orthodox place of worship at Quicksands, a temple not
merely opened up for an hour or so on Sunday mornings to be shut tight
during the remainder of the week although it was thronged with devotees
on the Sabbath. This temple, of course, was the Quicksands Club. Howard
Spence was quite orthodox; and, like some of our Puritan forefathers,
did not even come home to the midday meal on the first day of the week.
But a certain instinct of protest and of nonconformity which may have
been remarked in our heroine sent her to St. Andrews-by-the-Sea--by no
means so well attended as the house of Gad and Meni. She walked home in
a pleasantly contemplative state of mind through a field of daisies, and
had just arrived at the hedge in front of the Brackens when the sound
of hoofs behind her caused her to turn. Mr. Trixton Brent, very firmly
astride of a restive, flea-bitten polo pony, surveyed her amusedly.

"Where have you been?" said he.

"To church," replied Honora, demurely.

"Such virtue is unheard of in Quicksands."

"It isn't virtue," said Honora.

"I had my doubts about that, too," he declared.

"What is it, then?" she asked laughingly, wondering why he had such a
faculty of stirring her excit