k, and drew her face down
that she might kiss her, but the countess gently put Nell's arm from
her, and drew back from the proffered kiss.

"No; you shall not kiss me!" she said, in a low voice. "You will be glad
that you did not--presently! Stay--give me that flower!" she said,
holding out her hand, but looking away.

Nell started, and drew the flower from her bosom as if it had been
something poisonous, and flung it in the fire.

The countess shrugged her shoulders with an air of indifference, and
turned to watch the flower withering and consuming in the fire, and
Nell, with something like a sob, left her.

What should she do? She understood that her friend stood on the verge of
a precipice; but how could she--Nell--with all her desire to save her,
drag her back?

As she was going to her room she heard a step in the hall, and, looking
over the balustrade, saw the earl pass from the library to the
drawing-room. For an instant she was half resolved to go down to him,
to--what? How could she tell him? She dared not!

Lord Wolfer wandered into the drawing-room and stood before the fire,
looking into it moodily, as he leaned against the great mantelpiece of
carved marble.

He was thinking of the flower which he had seen first in his wife's
possession, then in Sir Archie's, and lastly in Nell's; and of her blush
and confusion when he had asked her how she came by it. He knew Sir
Archie, knew him better and more of his life than Sir Archie suspected.
The man was a perfect type of the modern lover; incapable of a fixed
passion, as fickle as the wind. Could it be that he had transferred,
what he would have called his "devotion," from the countess to Nell? It
seemed at first sight too improbable; but Wolfer knew his world and the
ethics of the smart set of which Sir Archie Walbrooke was a conspicuous
member too well to scout the idea as impossible. The fact that Sir
Archie had spent the last three months flirting with one woman would be
no hindrance to his transferring his attentions to a younger and
prettier one.

The harassed man turned away with a weary sigh, wandered purposelessly
into the anteroom, and, in a mechanical fashion, fingered the various
articles on the writing table. His eye fell on the book on the pedestal,
and he took up the volume absently, intending to restore it to its place
in the bookcase. On his way he opened the book, and a half sheet of note
paper fell from it and fluttered to his feet. He p