aced the young Lord's handsome countenance--forming, in short, his
final contribution to a display of high social candour unprecedented in
our hero's experience. No, he wasn't jealous, didn't do John Berridge
the honour to be, to the extent of the least glimmer of a spark of it,
but was so happy to see his immortal mistress do what she liked that he
could positively beam at the odd circumstance of her almost lavishing
public caresses on a gentleman not, after all, of negligible importance.

III

Well, it was all confounding enough, but this indication in particular
would have jostled our friend's grasp of the presented cup had he
had, during the next ten minutes, more independence of thought. That,
however, was out of the question when one positively felt, as with a
pang somewhere deep within, or even with a smothered cry for alarm,
one's whole sense of proportion shattered at a blow and ceasing to
serve. "Not _straight_, and not too fast, shall we?" was the ineffable
young woman's appeal to him, a few minutes later, beneath the wide glass
porch-cover that sheltered their brief wait for their chariot of fire.
It was there even as she spoke; the capped charioteer, with a great
clean curve, drew up at the steps of the porch, and the Princess's
footman, before rejoining him in front, held open the door of the car.
She got in, and Berridge was the next instant beside her; he could only
say: "As you like, Princess--where you will; certainly let us prolong
it; let us prolong everything; don't let us have it over--strange and
beautiful as it can only be!--a moment sooner than we must." So
he spoke, in the security of their intimate English, while the
perpendicular imperturbable _valet-de-pied_, white-faced in the electric
light, closed them in and then took his place on the box where the rigid
liveried backs of the two men, presented through the glass, were like a
protecting wall; such a guarantee of privacy as might come--it occurred
to Berridge's inexpugnable fancy--from a vision of tall guards erect
round Eastern seraglios.

His companion had said something, by the time they started, about their
taking a turn, their looking out for a few of the night-views of Paris
that were so wonderful; and after that, in spite of his constantly
prized sense of knowing his enchanted city and his way about, he ceased
to follow or measure their course, content as he was with the particular
exquisite assurance it gave him. _That_ was