oot-lights again, and make him once
more the lion of a day. More social flatteries, more doubtful
love-affairs! Fools like herself would feel his spell, would cherish and
caress him, only to be stung and scathed as she had been. The bitter
lines of his "portrait" rung in her ears--blackening and discrowning her
in her own eyes.

She abhorred him!--but the thought that he was in Venice burned deep
into senses and imagination. Should she tell William she had seen him?
No, no! She would stand by herself, protect herself!

So she stole back to bed, and lay there wakeful, starting guiltily at
William's every movement. If he knew what had happened!--what she was
thinking of! Why on earth should he? It would be monstrous to harass
him on his holiday--with all these political affairs on his mind.

Then suddenly--by an association of ideas--she sat up shivering, her
hands pressed to her breast. The telegram--the book! Oh, but <i>of course</i>
she had been in time!--<i>of course</i>! Why, she had offered the man two
hundred pounds! She lay down laughing at herself--forcing herself to try
and sleep.

XIX

Sir Richard Lyster unfolded his <i>Times</i> with a jerk.

"A beastly rheumatic hole I call this," he said, looking angrily at the
window of his hotel sitting-room, which showed drops from a light shower
then passing across the lagoon. "And the dilatoriness of these Italian
posts is, upon my soul, beyond bearing! This <i>Times</i> is <i>three</i> days
old."

Mary Lyster looked up from the letter she was writing.

"Why don't you read the French papers, papa? I saw a <i>Figaro</i> of
yesterday in the Piazza this morning."

"Because I can't!" was the indignant reply. "There wasn't the same
amount of money squandered on <i>my</i> education, my dear, that there has
been on yours."

Mary smiled a little, unseen. Her father had been, of course, at Eton.
She had been educated by a succession of small and hunted governesses,
mostly Swiss, whose remuneration had certainly counted among the
frugalities rather than the extravagances of the family budget.

Sir Richard read his <i>Times</i> for a while. Mary continued to write checks
for the board wages of the servants left at home, and to give directions
for the beating of carpets and cleaning of curtains. It was dull work,
and she detested it.

Presently Sir Richard rose, with a stretch. He was a tall old man, with
a shock of white hair and very black eyes. A victim to