a word or two. The girls have forgotten me. I
don't suppose I shall be asked to a single dance this winter."

"The ladies in St. Jude's church would make a pet of you if----"

"The old cats and kittens! No, thank you, I am not going to church
except on Sunday mornings--that is respectable and right; but as to
being the pet of St. Jude's ladies! No, no! How they would mew over my
delinquencies, and what scratches I should get from their velvet-shod
claws! If I have to be talked about, I prefer the ladies of the world to
discuss my frailties."

"But if I were you, I would give no one a reason for saying a word
against me. Why should you?"

"Fred will supply them with reasons. I can't keep the man away from me.
I don't believe I want to--he is very nice and useful."

"You are talking nonsense, things you don't mean, Dora. You are not
such a foolish woman as to like to be seen with Fred Mostyn, that little
monocular snob, after the aristocratic, handsome Basil Stanhope. The
comparison is a mockery. Basil is the finest gentleman I ever saw.
Socially, he is perfection, and----"

"He is only a clergyman."

"Even as a clergyman he is of religiously royal descent. There are
generations of clergymen behind him, and he is a prince in the pulpit.
Every man that knows him gives him the highest respect, every woman
thinks you the most fortunate of wives. No one cares for Fred Mostyn.
Even in his native place he is held in contempt. He had nine hundred
votes to young Rawdon's twelve thousand."

"I don't mind that. I am going to the matinee to-morrow with Fred. He
wanted to take me out in his auto this afternoon, but when I said I
would go if you would he drew back. What is the reason? Did he make you
offer of his hand? Did you refuse it?"

"He never made me an offer. I count that to myself as a great
compliment. If he had done such a thing, he would certainly have been
refused."

"I can tell that he really hates you. What dirty trick did you serve him
about Rawdon Court?"

"So he called the release of Squire Rawdon a 'dirty trick'? It would
have been a very dirty trick to have let Fred Mostyn get his way with
Squire Rawdon."

"Of course, Ethel, when a man lends his money as an obligation he
expects to get it back again."

"Mostyn got every farthing due him, and he wanted one of the finest
manors in Eng-land in return for the obligation. He did not get it,
thank God and my father!"

"He will not forget your father's