d contented bachelor until I was
twenty-eight, and then I met Diana Chetwynd for the first time. We were
spending Christmas at the same country-house, and it did not take me
long to become the most devoted of her many adorers. She was one of the
most variously accomplished girls I had ever met. She was a skilled
musician, a brilliant amateur actress; she could give most men thirty
out of a hundred at billiards, and her judgment and daring across the
most difficult country had won her the warm admiration of all
hunting-men. And she was neither fast nor horsey, seeming to find but
little pleasure in the society of mere sportsmen, to whose conversation
she infinitely preferred that of persons who, like myself, were rather
agreeable than athletic. I was not at that time, whatever I may be now,
without my share of good looks, and for some reason it pleased Miss
Chetwynd to show me a degree of favour which she accorded to no other
member of the house-party.

It was annoying to feel that my unfamiliarity with the open-air sports
in which she delighted debarred me from her company to so great an
extent; for it often happened that I scarcely saw her until the evening,
when I sometimes had the bliss of sitting next to her at dinner; but on
these occasions I could not help seeing that she found some pleasure in
my society.

I don't think I have mentioned that, besides being exquisitely lovely,
Diana was an heiress, and it was not without a sense of my own
presumption that I allowed myself to entertain the hope of winning her
at some future day. Still, I was not absolutely penniless, and she was
her own mistress, and I had some cause, as I have said, for believing
that she was, at least, not ill-disposed towards me. It seemed a
favourable sign, for instance, when she asked me one day why it was I
never rode. I replied that I had not ridden for years--though I did not
add that the exact number of those years was twenty-eight.

'Oh, but you must take it up again!' she said, with the prettiest air of
imperiousness. 'You ought to ride in the Row next season.'

'If I did,' I said, 'would you let me ride with you sometimes?'

'We should meet, of course,' she said; 'and it is such a pity not to
keep up your riding--you lose so much by not doing so.'

Was I wrong in taking this as an intimation that, by following her
advice, I should not lose my reward? If you had seen her face as she
spoke, you would have thought as I did then--as I