arcy, Madame
de Netteville, and two unknown men. One of them was introduced to
Elsmere as Mr. Spooner, and recognised by him as a Fellow of the Royal
Society, a famous mathematician, sceptic, _bon vivant_, and sayer of
good things. The other was a young Liberal Catholic, the author of a
remarkable collection of essays on mediaeval subjects in which the
squire, treating the man's opinions of course as of no account, had
instantly recognised the note of the true scholar. A pale, small, hectic
creature, possessed of that restless energy of mind which often goes
with the heightened temperature of consumption.

Robert took a seat by Madame de Netteville, whose appearance was
picturesqueness itself. Her dress, a skilful mixture of black and creamy
yellow, lay about her in folds, as soft, as carelessly effective as her
manner. Her plumed hat shadowed a face which was no longer young in such
a way as to hide all the lines possible; while the half-light brought
admirably out the rich dark smoothness of the tints, the black lustre of
the eyes. A delicate blue-veined hand lay upon her knee, and Robert was
conscious after ten minutes or so that all her movements, which seemed
at first merely slow and languid, were in reality singularly full of
decision and purpose.

She was not easy to talk to on a first acquaintance. Robert felt that
she was studying him, and was not so much at his ease as usual, partly
owing to fatigue and mental worry.

She asked him little abrupt questions about the neighbourhood, his
parish, his work, in a soft tone which had, however, a distinct
aloofness, even _hauteur_. His answers, on the other hand, were often a
trifle reckless and offhand. He was in a mood to be impatient with a
_mondaine's_ languid inquiries into clerical work, and it seemed to him
the squire's description had been overdone.

'So you try to civilise your peasants,' she said at last. 'Does it
succeed--is it worth while?'

'That depends upon your general ideas of what is worth while,' he
answered smiling.

'Oh, everything is worth while that passes the time,' she said
hurriedly. 'The clergy of the old _regime_ went through life half
asleep. That was their way of passing it. Your way, being a modern, is
to bustle and try experiments.'

Her eyes, half closed but none the less provocative, ran over Elsmere's
keen face and pliant frame. An atmosphere of intellectual and social
assumption enwrapped her, which annoyed Robert in much th