rte-blanche_ to a fashionable
upholsterer. She wore a blue-green Empire tea-gown, a long chain of
uncut turquoises, a scarab ring, and a curious comb in her black, loose
hair, and was always trying, and always trying in vain, to be unusual.
Her name was Lucy (as any one who understood the subject of names must
have seen at a glance), but she had changed it to Vera, on the ground
that it was more Russian. There seemed no special object in this, as
she had married a Scotchman. One really rare possession she certainly
had--a husband who, notwithstanding that he felt a mild dislike for her
merely, bullied her and interfered with her quite as much as if he were
wildly in love. He was a rising barrister, and nearly every evening Vera
had to undergo a very cross examination as to what she had done during
the day, while being only too well aware that he neither listened to her
answers, nor would have been interested if he had.

She sought compensation by being in a continual state of vague
enthusiasm about some one or other, invariably choosing for the god of
her idolatry some young man who, for one reason or another, could not
possibly respond in any way. Yet she was always very much admired,
except by the objects of her own Platonic admiration. This gave a
certain interest to her life; and her other great pleasure was
worshipping and confiding in her friend Felicity.

"Not the personal note!" repeated Mrs. Ogilvie, as if amazed. "I? I'm
nothing if not original! Why, I actually copied that extraordinary gown
we saw at the Gymnase when we were in Paris, and I wore it last night.
It was a good deal noticed too----"

"Oh, yes, you wore it; but you'd copied it. That's just the point,"
said Felicity. "You can't become original by imitating some one else's
peculiarities. The only way to be really unusual is to be oneself--which
hardly anybody is. I can't see, though, why on earth you should wish it.
It's much nicer to be like everybody else, I think."

"Oh, that you can know from hearsay only, dear," said Vera. "Your
husband's come back, hasn't he?" she added irrelevantly.

"Yes. Now, there _is_ an unusual man, if you like!" said Felicity. "He
has no pose of any sort or kind, and he hasn't the ordinary standard
about anything in any way, but likes people really and genuinely on
their _own_ merits--as he likes things--not because they're cheap or
dear!"

"It seems to me so extraordinary that a racing man who is more or less
of