ot done in a day--this gathering about her of so brilliant and
delightful a society. She had lived many years at Walpole Lodge, ever
since her widowhood, and was now quite an old lady. In her early life she
had written several charming books--chiefly biographies of distinguished
men whom she had known, and even now she occasionally put pen again to
paper, and sent some delightful social essay or some pleasantly written
critique to one or other of the Reviews of the day.

Her married life had been neither very long nor very happy. She had never
learnt to love her husband's country home. At his death she had turned
her back thankfully upon Kynaston, and had never seen it again. Of her
two sons, she stood in some awe of the elder, whose cold and unresponsive
character resembled her dead husband's, whilst she adored Maurice, who
was warm-hearted and affectionate in manner, like herself. There were ten
years between them, for she had been married twelve years; and at her
secret heart Lady Kynaston hoped and believed that John would remain
unmarried, so that the estates and the money might in time become
Maurice's.

It is the second Thursday in December, and Lady Kynaston is "at home" to
the world. Her drawing-rooms--there are three of them, not large, but
low, comfortable rooms, opening one out of the other--are filled, as
usual, with a mixed and brilliant crowd.

Across the square hall is the dining-room, where a cold supper, not very
sumptuous or very _recherche_, but still sufficient of its kind for the
occasion, is laid out; and beyond that is Lady Kynaston's boudoir, where
there is a piano, and which is used on these occasions as a music-room,
so that those who are musical may retire there, and neither interfere,
nor be interfered with, by the rest of the company. Some one is singing
in the music-room now--singing well, you may be sure, or he would not be
at Walpole Lodge--but the strains of the song can hardly be heard at all
across dining-room and hall, in the larger of the three rooms, where most
of the guests are congregated.

Lady Kynaston, a small, slight woman in soft gray satin and old lace,
moves about graciously and gracefully still, despite her seventy years,
among her guests--stopping now at one group, now at another, talking
politics to one, science to a second, whispering a few discreet words
about the latest scandal to this great lady, murmuring words of approval
upon her clever book or her charming po