thing."

"It is entirely at your service, Mr. Heigham."

"Well, really it is very awkward----"

"Shall I turn my head so as not to see your blushes?"

"Don't laugh at me, Lady Bellamy. Of course you will say nothing of
this."

"If you doubt my discretion, Mr. Heigham, do not choose me as a
confidante. You are going, unless I am mistaken, to speak to me about
Mrs. Carr."

"Yes, it is about her. But how did you know that? You always seem to
be able to read one's thoughts before one speaks. Do you know,
sometimes I think that she has taken a fancy to me, do you see, and I
wanted to ask you what you thought about it."

"Well, supposing that she had, most young men, Mr. Heigham, would not
talk of such a thing in a tone befitting a great catastrophe. But, if
I am not entering too deeply into particulars, what makes you think
so?"

"Well, really, I don't exactly know. She sometimes gives me a general
idea."

"Oh, then, there has been nothing tangible."

"Well, yes, once she took my hand, or I took hers, I don't know which;
but I don't think much of that, because it's the sort of thing that's
always happening, don't you know, and nine times out of ten means
nothing at all. But why I ask you about it is that, if there is
anything of the sort, I had better cut and run out of this, because it
would not be fair to stop, either to her, or to Angela, or myself. It
would be dangerous, you see, playing with such a woman as Mildred."

"So you would go away if you thought that she took any warmer interest
in you than ladies generally do in men engaged to be married."

"Certainly I should."

"Well, then, I think that I can set your mind at ease. I have observed
Mrs. Carr pretty closely, and in the way you suppose she cares for you
no more than she does for your coat. She is, no doubt, a bit of a
flirt, and very likely wishes to get you to fall in love with her--a
natural ambition on the part of a woman; but, as for being in love
with you herself, the idea is absurd. Women of the world do not fall
in love so readily; they are too much taken up with thinking about
themselves to have time to think about anybody else. With them it is
all self, self, self, from morning till night. Besides, look at the
common-sense side of the thing. Do you suppose it likely that a person
of Mrs. Carr's wealth and beauty, who has only to lift her hand to
have all London at her feet, is likely to fix her affections upon a
young man whom she kno