ngwood, he'd find himself unhorsed
by a woman), grew grave and stern, haunted with ten times more
recklessness than usual, and threw away his guineas at the Redoute in a
wild way, quite new with him, for though he liked play _pour s'amuser_,
he had too much control over his passions ever to let play get
ascendancy over him. I used to think he had the strongest passions and
the strongest will over them of any man I knew; but now a passion least
undesired and most hopeless of any that ever entered his soul, seemed to
have mastered him. Not that he showed it; with the Tressillian he was
simply distantly courteous; but I, who was on the _qui vive_ for his
first sign of being conquered, saw his eyebrows contract when somebody
was paying her desperate court, and his glance lighten and flash when
she passed near him. They had never been alone since the night of the
ball, and Violet was too proud to try for a reconciliation, even if
she'd cared for one.

One night we were at a ball at the Prince Humbugandschwerinn's. The
Tressillian had been waltzing with all her might, and had all the men in
the room, Humbugandschwerinn himself included, round her. Telfer leaned
against a console ten minutes, watching her, and then abruptly left the
ball-room, and did not return again. He came instead into the card-room,
and sat down to _ecarte_ with De Tintiniac, and lost two games at ten
Napoleons a side. Generally, he played very steadily, never giving his
attention to anything but the game; but now he was listening to what a
knot of men were saying, who were laughing, chatting, and sipping
coffee, while they talked about--the Tressillian.

"I mark the king and play," said Telfer, his eyes fixed fiercely on a
young fellow who was discussing Violet much as he'd have discussed his
new Danish dog or English hunter. He was Jack Snobley, Lord
Featherweight's son, who was doing the grand, a confounded young
parvenu, vulgar as his cotton-spinning ancestry could make him, who
could appreciate the Tressillian about as much as he could Dannecker's
Ariadne, which work of art he pronounced, in my hearing, "a pretty girl,
but the dawg very badly done--too much like a cat." "I take your three
to two," continued Telfer, his brow lowering as he heard the young fool
praising and criticising Violet with small ceremony. The Major had the
haughtiest patrician principles, and to hear a snob like this
sandy-haired honorable, speaking of the woman _he_ chose to