d laugh,
bitterly contemptuous. 'Oh, what a worm--what a thing I am! It tempted
me. To be my lady, and to have my jewels, and to go to Ranelagh and the
masquerades! To have my box at the King's House and my frolic in the
pit! And my woman as ugly as I liked--if he might have my lips! Think of
it, think of it! That anyone should be so low! Or no, no, no!' she cried
in a different tone. 'Don't believe me! I am not that! I am not so vile!
But I thought he had tricked me, I thought he had cheated me, I thought
that this was his work, and I was mad! I think I was mad!'

'Dear, dear,' Mr. Fishwick said rubbing his head. His tone was
sympathetic; yet, strange to relate, there was no real smack of sorrow
in it. Nay, an acute ear might have caught a note of relief, of hope,
almost of eagerness. 'Dear, dear, to be sure!' he continued; 'I
suppose--it was Lord Almeric Doyley, the nobleman I saw at Oxford?'

'Yes!'

'And you don't know what to do, child?'

'To do?' she exclaimed.

'Which--I mean which you shall accept. Really,' Mr. Fishwick continued,
his brain succumbing to a kind of vertigo as he caught himself balancing
the pretensions of Sir George and Lord Almeric, 'it is a very remarkable
position for any young lady to enjoy, however born. Such a choice--'

'Choice!' she cried fiercely, out of the darkness. 'There is no choice.
Don't you understand? I told him No, no, no, a thousand times No!'

Mr. Fishwick sighed. 'But I understood you to say,' he answered meekly,
'that you did not know what to do.'

'How to tell Sir George! How to tell him.'

Mr. Fishwick was silent a moment. Then he said earnestly, 'I would not
tell him. Take my advice, child. No harm has been done. You said No to
the other.'

'I said Yes,' she retorted.

'But I thought--'

'And then I said No,' she cried, between tears and foolish laughter.
'Cannot you understand?'

Mr. Fishwick could not; but, 'Anyway, do not tell him,' he said. 'There
is no need, and before marriage men think much of that at which they
laugh afterwards.'

'And much of a woman of whom they think nothing afterwards,' she
answered.

'Yet do not tell him,' he pleaded. From the sound of his voice she knew
that he was leaning forward. 'Or at least wait. Take the advice of one
older than you, who knows the world, and wait.'

'And talk to him, listen to him, smile on his suit with a lie in my
heart? Never?' she cried. Then with a new strange pride, a faint touch
of statelin