to the Imperial League banquet, had he not incited
Lady Richard to have her at Ashwood? And now she spread this scare
through the house; she outran the limits--all the reasonable limits--of
interest, she did far more than ever he had asked of her, she cast
reflections on his judgment by pushing it to extremes whither it had
never been meant to stretch. She had been bidden to watch Alexander
Quisante, to admire his great moments, to see a future for him, and to
applaud the discerning eye which had seen that future first. But who had
bidden her make a friend of the man, take him into the inner circle,
treat him as one who belonged to the group of her intimates, to the
company of her equals and of those with whom she had grown up? Almost
passionately Dick disclaimed the responsibility for this; with no less
heat his wife forced it on him; relentlessly the course of events seemed
to charge him with it.

What would happen he did not know; none of them at Ashwood professed to
know; they refused to forecast the worst. But what had actually happened
was that Quisante was undoubtedly in love with May Gaston, and that May
Gaston was no less certainly wrapped up in Quisante. The difference of
terms was fondly clung to; and indeed she showed no signs of love as love
is generally understood; she displayed only an open preference for his
society and an engrossed interest in him. It was bad enough; who could
tell when it might become worse? "I will buy with you, sell with you,
talk with you, walk with you, and so following; but I will not eat with
you, drink with you, nor pray with you." Allowing for difference of times
and customs, that had been the attitude of all towards Quisante; a
caste-feeling, almost a race-feeling, dictated it and kept it alive and
strong under all superficial alliance and outward friendliness. But May
had seen the barrier only to throw it down in a passion of scorn for its
narrowness and an impulse of indignation at its cruelty. If she had gone
so far, he was bold who dared to say that she would not go farther, or
would set a limit to her advance on the path that the rest of them had
never trodden.

"At any rate it shan't happen here," said Lady Richard. "I should never
be able to look her mother in the face again."

"It won't happen anywhere," Dick protested. "But you can't turn him out,
you know."

"I can't unless I absolutely literally do. He won't see that he isn't
wanted."

"No; and he may be excu