versation with a florid man of
uncertain age.

'Couldn't get here before, my dear boy.'

'Surely you haven't brought that fellow with you?'

'Hush! You mustn't talk in that way. We met at the door. Mrs. Dane knows
him. What does it matter?'

Horace moved aside to Fanny. Flushed with excitement, her hair adorned
with flowers, she looked very pretty.

'Come along,' he said, gripping her hand more violently than he
intended. 'Let us get upstairs.'

'Oh, you hurt me! Don't be so silly.'

The man beside her gave Horace a friendly nod. His name was Mankelow.
Horace had met him once or twice of late at Mrs. Damerel's, but did not
like him, and felt still less disposed to do so now that Mankelow
was acquainted with Fanny French. He suspected that the two were more
familiar than Fanny pretended. With little ceremony, he interposed
himself between the girl and this possible rival.

'Why didn't you make her come earlier?' he said to Fanny, as they began
a slow upward struggle in the rear of Mrs. Damerel.

'It isn't fashionable to come early.'

'Nonsense! Look at the people here already.'

Fanny threw up her chin, and glanced back to see that Mankelow was
following. In his vexation, Horace was seized with a cough--a cough
several times repeated before he could check it.

'Your cold's no better,' said Fanny. 'You oughtn't to have come out at
night.'

'It _is_ better,' he replied sharply. 'That's the first time I've
coughed to-day. Do you mean you would rather not have found me here?'

'How silly you are! People will hear what you're saying.'

It was Fanny's 'first season,' but not her first 'at home.' Mrs. Damerel
seemed to be taking an affectionate interest in her, and had introduced
her to several people. Horace, gratified in the beginning, now suffered
from jealousy; it tortured him to observe Fanny when she talked with
men. That her breeding was defective, mattered nothing in this
composite world of pseudo-elegance. Young Lord, who did not lack native
intelligence, understood by this time that Mrs. Damerel and her friends
were far from belonging to a high order of society; he saw vulgarity
rampant in every drawing-room to which he was admitted, and occasionally
heard things which startled his suburban prejudices. But Fanny, in
her wild enjoyment of these novel splendours, appeared to lose all
self-control. She flirted outrageously, and before his very eyes. If he
reproached her, she laughed at him; if he threa