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miles from the Princess, applause from the audience; an evening, in fact, all froth and sweetstuff, from which Lady Parham emerged grimly content, conscious at the same time that she was henceforward very decidedly, and rather disagreeably, in the Ashes' debt; while Elizabeth Tranmore went home in a tremor of delight, happily persuaded that Ashe's path was now clear. Kitty listened, sometimes pleased, sometimes inclined to be critical or scornful of her mother-in-law's praise. But she did love Lady Tranmore, and on the whole she smiled. Smiles, indeed, had been Kitty's portion since that evening of strange emotion, when she had found herself sobbing in William's arms for reasons quite beyond her own defining. It was as if, like the prince in the fairy tale, some iron band round her heart had given way. She seemed to dance through the house; she devoured her child with kisses; and she was even willing sometimes to let William tell her what his mother suspected of the progress of Mary's affair with Geoffrey Cliffe, though she carefully avoided speaking directly to Lady Tranmore about it. As to Cliffe himself, she seemed to have dropped him out of her thoughts. She never mentioned him, and Ashe could only suppose she had found him disenchanting. "Well, darling! I hope I have made a sufficient fool of myself to please you!" Ashe had thrown the door wide, and stood on the threshold, arrayed in the brocade and fur of a Venetian noble. He was a somewhat magnificent apparition, and Kitty, who had coaxed or driven him into the dress, gave a scream of delight. She saw him before her own glass, and the crimson senator made eyes at the white goddess as they posed triumphantly together. "You're a very rococo sort of goddess, you know, Kitty!" said Ashe. "Not much Greek about you!" "Quite as much as I want, thank you," said Kitty, courtesying to her own reflection in the glass. "Fanchette could have taught them a thing or two! Now come along! Ah! Wait!" And, gathering up her possessions, she left the room. Ashe, following her, saw that she was going to the nursery, a large room on the back staircase. At the threshold she turned back and put her finger to her lip. Then she slipped in, reappearing a moment afterwards to say, in a whisper, "Nurse is not in bed. You may come in." Nurse, indeed, knew much better than to be in bed. She had been sitting up to see her ladyship's splendors, and she rose smiling as Ashe entered th
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