ou'll
allow me I'll try my hand."

Julie Le Breton did not reply, but her face glimmered upon him with a
wistful friendliness that did not escape him, even in the darkness. In
this yielding mood her voice and movements had so much subdued
sweetness, so much distinction, that he felt himself more than melting
towards her.

Then, of a sudden, a thought--a couple of thoughts--sped across him. He
drew himself rather sharply together.

"Mr. Delafield, I gather, has been a good deal concerned in the whole
matter?"

Mademoiselle Le Breton laughed and hesitated.

"He has been very kind. He heard Lady Henry's language once when she was
excited. It seemed to shock him. He has tried once or twice to smooth
her down. Oh, he has been most kind!"

"Has he any influence with her?"

"Not much."

"Do you think well of him?"

He turned to her with a calculated abruptness. She showed a little
surprise.

"I? But everybody thinks well of him. They say the Duke trusts
everything to him."

"When I left England he was still a rather lazy and unsatisfactory
undergraduate. I was curious to know how he had developed. Do you know
what his chief interests are now?"

Mademoiselle Le Breton hesitated.

"I'm really afraid I don't know," she said, at last, smiling, and, as it
were, regretful. "But Evelyn Crowborough, of course, could tell you all
about him. She and he are very old friends."

"No birds out of that cover," was Sir Wilfrid's inward comment.

The lamp over Lady Henry's door was already in sight when Sir Wilfrid,
after some talk of the Montresors, with whom he was going to dine that
night, carelessly said:

"That's a very good-looking fellow, that Captain Warkworth, whom I saw
with Lady Henry last night."

"Ah, yes. Lady Henry has made great friends with him," said Mademoiselle
Julie, readily. "She consults him about her memoir of her husband."

"Memoir of her husband!" Sir Wilfrid stopped short. "Heavens above!
Memoir of Lord Henry?"

"She is half-way through it. I thought you knew."

"Well, upon my word! Whom shall we have a memoir of next? Henry
Delafield! Henry Delafield! Good gracious!"

And Sir Wilfrid walked along, slashing at the railings with his stick,
as though the action relieved him. Julie Le Breton quietly resumed:

"I understand that Lord Henry and Captain Warkworth's father went
through the Indian Mutiny together, and Captain Warkworth has some
letters--"

"Oh, I dare say--I dare say," mutter