, you are playing your cards
ill--staring like one daft at that singer who is no beauty, and
forgetting to acknowledge Sir Maxwell Danby last evening when he made
you that low bow. Why, child, don't you know he is a great catch?"

Griselda's cheeks flushed crimson.

"Your ladyship forgets we are not alone."

"Ha! ha! as if my waiting-maid was not in all my little secrets. No
love-story is new to her, is it, Graves?"

The person thus referred to, who had been engaged in plaiting ruffles
with a small iron, and sprinkling the fine lace with a few drops of
starched water as she did so, on hearing her name, turned her head in
the direction of her mistress, and said:

"Did you speak, my lady?"

"_You_ know--_you_ know, Graves. You know all about my billets-doux, and
my pretty gentlemen."

If Melia, otherwise Amelia Graves, knew, her face showed no sign of
intelligence. It was a stolid face, hard and plain-featured, and she was
a strange mixture of devotion to her frivolous mistress, and strong
disapproval of that mistress's ways and behaviour. The real devotion and
affection for a family she had served for many years, often gained the
day, when she turned over in her mind the possibility of leaving a
service which involved so much of the world and its customs, which she
was the indirect means of encouraging by her continuous attention to all
the finery and gauds, in which Lady Betty Longueville delighted.

Lady Betty was the widow of a rich gentleman, to whom she had been
married but a few years, when death ended what could not have ever been
more than a _mariage de convenance_. An orphan niece of Mr.
Longueville's, the child of a sister who had made what was considered a
_mesalliance_, had been left to Lady Betty as a legacy, and was
particularly mentioned in Mr. Longueville's concise will. His estate in
Ireland devolved on the next heir, but Mr. Longueville had accumulated a
pretty little fortune, which he had the power to settle on his wife. The
estate was entailed, but the money was his to leave as he chose. Lady
Betty had fully grasped the situation before she had accepted Mr.
Longueville's proposal, and the understanding that Griselda Mainwaring
was to be thrown into the bargain was rather agreeable than otherwise.
Strange to say, Mr. Longueville did not leave Griselda any money, and
simply stated that his niece, Griselda Mainwaring, the only issue of the
unhappy marriage of his sister, Dorothy Mainwaring, _nee