little tilt of her pretty chin.

"Is it a riddle?" asks Dysart. "If so I know it. The answer is--Dicky
Browne."

"Oh, I _like_ that!" says Mr. Browne unabashed. "See here, I'll give you
plus fifteen, and a bisque, and start myself at minus thirty, and beat
you in a canter."

"Dear Mr. Browne, consider the day! I believe there are such things as
sunstrokes," says Lady Swansdown, in her sweet treble.

"There are. But Dicky's all right," says Lord Baltimore, drawing up a
garden chair close to hers, and seating himself upon it. "His head is
safe. The sun makes no impression upon granite!"

"Ah, _granite_! that applies to a heart not a head," says Lady
Swansdown, resting her blue eyes on Baltimore's for just a swift second.

It is wonderful, however, what her eyes can do in a second. Baltimore
laughs lightly, returns her glance four-fold, and draws his chair a
quarter of an inch closer to hers. To move it more than that would have
been an impossibility. Lady Swansdown makes a slight movement. With a
smile seraphic as an angel's, she pulls her lace skirts a little to one
side, as if to prove to Baltimore that he has encroached beyond his
privileges upon her domain. "People should not _crush_ people. And _why_
do you want to get so very close to me?" This question lies within the
serene eyes she once more raises to his.

She is a lovely woman, blonde, serene, dangerous! In each glance she
turns upon the man who happens at any moment to be next to her, lies an
entire chapter on the "Whole Art of Flirtation." Were she reduced to
penury, and the world a little more advanced in its fashionable ways,
she might readily make a small fortune in teaching young ladies "How to
Marry Well." No man could resist her pupils, once properly finished by
her and turned out to prey upon the stronger sex. "The Complete Angler"
would be a title they might filch with perfect honor and call their own.

She is a tall beauty, with soft limbs, graceful as a panther, or a cat.
Her eyes are like the skies in summer time, her lips sweet and full. The
silken hair that falls in soft masses on her Grecian brow is light as
corn in harvest, and she has hands and feet that are absolutely
faultless. She has even more than all these--a most convenient husband,
who is not only now but apparently always in a position of trust abroad.
Very _much_ abroad. The Fiji, or the Sandwich Islands for choice. One
can't hear from those centres of worldly dissipation in