ment of her will in his favor. It was amazing how she had taken to
Diana! Diana had only to accept him, and his future was secured.

But though thoughts of this kind passed in tumultuous procession through
the grooves of consciousness, they were soon expelled by others. Marsham
was no mere interested schemer. Diana should help him to his career; but
above all and before all she was the adorable brown-eyed creature, whose
looks had just been shining upon him, whose soft hand had just been
lingering in his! As he stood alone and spellbound in the dark, yielding
himself to the surging waves of feeling which broke over his mind, the
thought, the dream, of holding Diana Mallory in his arms--of her head
against his breast--came upon him with a sudden and stinging delight.

Yet the delight was under control--the control of a keen and practical
intelligence. There rose in him a sharp sense of the unfathomed depths
and possibilities in such a nature as Diana's. Once or twice that
evening, through all her sweet forthcomingness, when he had forced the
note a little, she had looked at him in sudden surprise or shrinking.
No!--nothing premature! It seemed to him, as it had seemed to Bobbie
Forbes, that she could only be won by the slow and gradual conquest of a
rich personality. He set himself to the task.

* * * * *

Down-stairs Mr. Ferrier and Sir James Chide were sitting together in a
remote corner of the hall. Mr. Ferrier, in great good-humor with the
state of things, was discussing Oliver's chances, confidentially, with
his old friend. Sir James sat smoking in silence. He listened to
Ferrier's praises of Miss Mallory, to his generous appreciation of
Marsham's future, to his speculations as to what Lady Lucy would do for
her son, upon his marriage, or as to the part which a creature so
brilliant and so winning as Diana might be expected to play in London
and in political life.

Sir James said little or nothing. He knew Lady Lucy well, and had known
her long. Presently he rose abruptly and went up-stairs to bed.

"Ought I to speak?" he asked himself, in an agony of doubt. "Perhaps a
word to Ferrier?--"

No!--impossible!--impossible! Yet, as he mounted the stairs, over the
house which had just seen the triumph of Diana, over that radiant figure
itself, the second sight of the great lawyer perceived the brooding of a
cloud of fate; nor could he do anything to avert or soften its downfall.