ll go back in some man's brougham--that is what
she has been waiting for; otherwise, she would have perched herself up on
the box-seat of the coach, in the most conspicuous place she could find."

"What a disgraceful creature she must be!" is the indignantly virtuous
reply.

The "Nevill girl," however, disappointed the expectations of both these
charitable ladies by quietly taking her place in Mrs. Hazeldine's
brougham, by her friend's side, amid a shower of "Good-nights" from the
remainder of the party.

"Ah!" said the nonentity, with a vicious gasp, "you may be sure she has
some disreputable supper of men, and cigars, and brandies and sodas
waiting for her up in town, or she would never go off so meekly as that
in Mrs. Hazeldine's brougham. Still waters run deep, my dear!"

"She is a horrid, disreputable girl, I am quite sure of that," is the
answer. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I haven't the misfortune of
knowing her."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

MRS. HAZELDINE'S "LONG ELIZA."

Now will I show myself to have more of the serpent than the
dove; that is, more knave than fool.

Christopher Marlowe.

For every inch that is not fool is rogue.

Dryden.

The scene is Mrs. Hazeldine's drawing-room, in Park Lane, the hour is
four o'clock in the afternoon, and the _dramatis personae_ are Miss
Nevill, very red in the face, standing in a corner, behind an oblong
velvet table covered with china ornaments, and Monsieur Le Vicomte
D'Arblet, also red in the face, gesticulating violently on the further
side of it.

Miss Nevill, having retired behind the oblong table, purely from
prudential motives of personal safety, is devoured with anxiety
concerning the too imminent fate of her hostess' china. There is a little
Lowestoft tea-service that was picked up only last week at Christie and
Manson's, a turquoise blue crackle jar that is supposed to be priceless,
and a pair of "Long Eliza" vases, which her hostess loves as much as she
does her toy terrier, and far better than she loves her husband.

What will become of her, Vera Nevill, if Mrs. Hazeldine comes in
presently and finds these treasures lying in a thousand pieces upon the
floor? And yet this is what she is looking forward to, as only too
probable a catastrophe.

Vera feels much as must have felt the owner of the proverbial bull
in the crockery shop--terror mingled with an overpowering sense of
responsibility. All personal considerations are