"I can't explain now. I don't
understand it myself; but I've seen enough to know that I should only
lose him altogether if I tried to force him. You know him, or ought to
do so! Did you ever get anything from Drake by driving him? He had no
opportunity of speaking, of explaining."

"By gad! I don't understand it!" he muttered. "Either you're engaged to
him or you're not. You led me to believe that the match was on
again----"

The fan closed with a snap, and her blue eyes flashed at him with bitter
scorn.

"Hadn't you better leave me to play the game?" she asked. "Or perhaps
you think you can play it better than I can? If so----The man has
stopped; Drake will be down again. I don't want him to see us talking.
Go--and get some more champagne."

Lord Turfleigh swore behind the hand that still fumbled at his mustache,
and walked away with the jerky, jaunty gait of the old man who still
affects youth, and Lady Luce composed her lovely face into a look of
emotional ecstacy.

"Oh, how beautiful, Drake!" she said. "Do you know that I have been very
nearly crying? And yet it was so sweet, so--so soothing! Who is he? And
what are we going to do now?" she asked, without waiting for an answer
to her first question, about which she was more than indifferent.

Drake looked round for the duchess.

"I must take the duchess in to supper," he said apologetically. "I will
find some one for you--or perhaps you will wait until I will come for
you?"

"I will wait, of course," she said, with a tender emphasis on the "of
course."

Those who had been listening followed Drake and the duchess to the
supper room, talking of the wonderful violin playing as they went; and
Lady Luce seated herself in a recess and waited. Several men came to her
and offered to take her to supper, but she made some excuse for
refusing, and presently Drake returned.

She rose and took his arm, and glanced up at him, not for the first time
that evening, curiously. The easy-going, indolent Drake of old seemed to
have disappeared, and left in his place this grave and almost
stern-mannered man. She had always been just a little afraid of him,
with the fear which is always felt by the false and shifty in the
presence of the true and strong; and to-night she was painfully
conscious of that vague and wholesome dread.

He found a place for her at a small table, and a footman brought them
things to eat and drink; but though she affected a blythe and joyous
mood,