Paula noticed that her eyes
were continually drawn as if by fascination towards the photograph on
the floor, which, contrary to his first impulse, Dare, as has been
said, now seemed in no hurry to regain. Surmising at last that the card,
whatever it was, had something to do with the exclamation, Paula picked
it up.

It was a portrait of Somerset; but by a device known in photography
the operator, though contriving to produce what seemed to be a perfect
likeness, had given it the distorted features and wild attitude of a man
advanced in intoxication. No woman, unless specially cognizant of such
possibilities, could have looked upon it and doubted that the photograph
was a genuine illustration of a customary phase in the young man's
private life.

Paula observed it, thoroughly took it in; but the effect upon her was by
no means clear. Charlotte's eyes at once forsook the portrait to dwell
on Paula's face. It paled a little, and this was followed by a hot
blush--perceptibly a blush of shame. That was all. She flung the picture
down on the table, and moved away.

It was now Mr. Power's turn. Anticipating Dare, who was advancing with
a deprecatory look to seize the photograph, he also grasped it. When he
saw whom it represented he seemed both amused and startled, and after
scanning it a while handed it to the young man with a queer smile.

'I am very sorry,' began Dare in a low voice to Mr. Power. 'I fear I was
to blame for thoughtlessness in not destroying it. But I thought it was
rather funny that a man should permit such a thing to be done, and that
the humour would redeem the offence.'

'In you, for purchasing it,' said Paula with haughty quickness from the
other side of the room. 'Though probably his friends, if he has any,
would say not in him.'

There was silence in the room after this, and Dare, finding himself
rather in the way, took his leave as unostentatiously as a cat that has
upset the family china, though he continued to say among his apologies
that he was not aware Mr. Somerset was a personal friend of the ladies.

Of all the thoughts which filled the minds of Paula and Charlotte De
Stancy, the thought that the photograph might have been a fabrication
was probably the last. To them that picture of Somerset had all the
cogency of direct vision. Paula's experience, much less Charlotte's, had
never lain in the fields of heliographic science, and they would as soon
have thought that the sun could again st