good deal."

"What was it about?" asked Hylda as they left the box. She had a sudden
throb of the heart. Was it the one great question, that which had been
like a gulf of fire between them?

"Oh, Turkey--the unpardonable Turk," answered Windlehurst. "As good a
defence of a bad case as I ever heard."

"Yes, Eglington would do that well," said the Duchess enigmatically,
drawing her cloak around her and adjusting her hair. Hylda looked at her
sharply, and Lord Windlehurst slyly, but the Duchess seemed oblivious of
having said anything out of the way, and added: "It's a gift seeing all
that can be said for a bad cause, and saying it, and so making the other
side make their case so strong that the verdict has to be just."

"Dear Duchess, it doesn't always work out that way," rejoined
Windlehurst with a dry laugh. "Sometimes the devil's advocate wins."

"You are not very complimentary to my husband," retorted Hylda, looking
him in the eyes, for she was not always sure when he was trying to
baffle her.

"I'm not so sure of that. He hasn't won his case yet. He has only staved
off the great attack. It's coming--soon."

"What is the great attack? What has the Government, or the Foreign
Office, done or left undone?"

"Well, my dear--" Suddenly Lord Windlehurst remembered himself, stopped,
put up his eyeglass, and with great interest seemed to watch a gay
group of people opposite; for the subject of attack was Egypt and the
Government's conduct in not helping David, in view not alone of his
present danger, but of the position of England in the country, on which
depended the security of her highway to the East. Windlehurst was a good
actor, and he had broken off his words as though the group he was now
watching had suddenly claimed his attention. "Well, well, Duchess,"
he said reflectively, "I see a new nine days' wonder yonder." Then, in
response to a reminder from Hylda, he continued: "Ah, yes, the attack!
Oh, Persia--Persia, and our feeble diplomacy, my dear lady, though you
mustn't take that as my opinion, opponent as I am. That's the charge,
Persia--and her cats."

The Duchess breathed a sigh of relief; for she knew what Windlehurst had
been going to say, and she shrank from seeing what she felt she would
see, if Egypt and Claridge Pasha's name were mentioned. That night at
Harnley had burnt a thought into her mind which she did not like. Not
that she had any pity for Eglington; her thought was all for this girl
she